AMD’s Threadripper processors could put an end to Intel’s dominance in CPUs
Why it matters to you
Although these chips are unlikely to be cheap, they could offer people an alternative to Intel’s top-end line of CPUs.
If the leaked information for AMD’s upcoming R9 Threadripper CPUs turns out to be true, it could mean that AMD created the most powerful desktop processors ever. With up to 16 cores, near 4GHz clock speeds, and support for faster memory than Intel’s upcoming Core i9 CPUs, AMD could be poised to capture the performance crown for the first time in nearly 15 years.
Long-term hardware enthusiasts may remember the early 2000s where Athlon 64 CPUs smashed Intel’s Pentium 4 series processors, creating more competition in the CPU market than we have seen since. Threadripper has the potential to shake things up.
The leaked information reveals the entire Threadripper lineup, which will be compatible with a revised version of the SP3 socket designed for its Naples server components, codenamed SP3r2. Physically, the chips are too large for AM4 chipsets which were released with Ryzen 7 and 5 support earlier in 2017.
The king of the Threadripper hill is the Ryzen 9 1998X and R9 1998, which come with 16 cores and 32 threads apiece, with the former hitting 3.5GHz as its base clock, boosting up to 3.9GHz, while the latter has a more modest 3.2Ghz and 3.6GHz clock speeds. Each chip, however, has a TDP of just 155w, which would make them five watts less than Intel’s planned top of the line, i9-7920X CPU.
Further down the Threadripper range are the R9 1977X and 1977 chips, which have a 100MHz bump to boosted clock speeds, but drop the core and thread count to 14/28, respectively. There is also a 1976X chip, which sports the same 14 cores, 28 threads with a higher clock speed of 3.6GHz and 4.1GHz when boosted.
The 1956X and 1956 drop that down to 12 cores and 24 threads, with clock speeds of 3.2Ghz/3.8GHz and 3.0Ghz/3.7GHz apiece.
The entry-level portion of the range are the R9 1955X and 1955 chips, which sport 10 cores and 20 threads each, with 3.6GHz/4.0GHz and 3.1GHz/3.7GHz clock speeds each. Their TDP is much lower too, at just 125W.
The whole range, however, sports 44 PCIExpress lanes and there is support for quad channel DDR4 memory as well.
All of those specifications are impressive in their own right, but as WCCFTech points out, they even go beyond what Intel has planned for its upcoming Skylake X and Kaby Lake X processor ranges. The Ryzen R9 chips will offer more cores and threads across the range, as well as more PCIExpress lanes at the lower end.
Of course, all of this is leaked information so we will want to await official confirmation before jumping to conclusions, but this new AMD range has serious potential. If it all turns out to be true, AMD could capture the top-end performance crown from Intel for the first time in 14 years and give everyone from professionals to hardware enthusiasts a much greater range of options than they are typically presented with.
Although not officially announced, rumors suggest AMD will unveil the Ryzen 9 lineup at Computex at the end of May, with a launch set to coincide with the Naples chip launch in June.
>>>>>>> h-dtwp-2254-4
Roccat looks to be ‘leader’ in PC gaming devices with Leadr wireless mouse
Why it matters to you
PC gamers who want to cut the cord to their mouse now have a new option from Roccat with the release of Leadr, which packs an Owl-Eye optical sensor.
On Monday, May 15, PC gaming peripheral maker Roccat announced the launch of a new wireless mouse, the Leadr. It features a polling rate of 1,000Hz, meaning the device updates the computer with input information once every millisecond. By comparison, the average wired desktop mouse updates the processor every eight milliseconds or so, thus Roccat is pushing an extremely high refresh rate on a wireless device because in a game, every millisecond counts.
Backing the 1,000Hz polling rate is a custom Pixart 3361 optical sensor Roccat dubs the Owl-Eye. According to the specs, this sensor has a sensitivity up to 12,000 dots per inch, a maximum acceleration of 50G, a maximum tracking speed of 250 inches per second, and a framerate of up to 12,000 frames per second. The sensor comes packed with an IR LED inside a 16-pin molded lead-free DIP package.
However, Roccat says the custom Owl-Eye sensor is optimized for the “golden range” between 400 and 3,000 DPI. Thus, PC gamers may not experience high precision tracking when going beyond that 3,000 DPI threshold.
“9 out of 10 professional gamers choose a DPI under 2,000 due to the undesirable smoothing that occurs at DPIs above that — in every sensor. Our own Roccat pros do the same,” the company says. “When developing Owl-Eye, we focused on accuracy and responsiveness within the golden range.”
Here are the hardware specs provided on the product page:
Wireless transmission:
2.4GHz band
Polling rate:
1,000Hz
Battery duration:
20 hours
Button count:
14 ergonomic + 2D Titan Wheel
Lighting:
16.8 million colors
Separate color zones:
Logo
Mouse Wheel
Processor:
32-bit ARM Cortex-MO chip @ 72MHz
On-board memory:
512KB
Maximum DPI:
12,000
Acceleration speed:
50G
Maximum speed:
250 inches per second
Lift-off distance:
Adjustable
Cable length:
71 inches
Cable type:
Micro USB to USB
Size (inches):
3.18 x 1.81 x 5.07
Weight (pounds):
0.295
According to Roccat, all 14 buttons are fully programmable through the free Swarm software. These buttons are joined by the X-Celerator single-axis analog thumb paddle mounted on the left side, meaning this mouse wasn’t designed for left-handed PC gamers. There’s also a mid-knuckle dorsal Fin Switch “for rapid and instinctive control.”
Packed with the new Leadr mouse is a premium charging dock stand for juicing up the included 20-hour battery. It connects directly to the PC to send and receive wireless signals from the mouse. But if the peripheral has a low battery and the user still needs to game on, the “top-up” cable can be detached from the dock and plugged straight into the mouse.
Finally, in addition to programming the buttons, Leadr owners can customize the two lighting zones as well with the Swarm software for Windows, Android, and iOS. Here users can store their settings in the cloud, share their profiles and macros, and even manage the device through their smartphone and/or tablet. Swarm serves as the hub for all connected Roccat devices, and even supports the AlienFX lighting systems on Alienware desktops and laptops.
Roccat’s new wireless Leadr mouse for PC gaming is available to pre-order now for $140 on Roccat’s website. The peripheral isn’t slated to ship until May 31, 2017.
Artificially intelligent Google Assistant could soon join Siri on iOS devices
Why it matters to you
Pretty soon, you won’t need to choose between Siri and Google Assistant. iOS users could get the best of both worlds.
The artificial intelligence behind the Google Home speaker and Google’s Allo messing app could come to the iPhone within “days.” That’s according to an Android Police, which claims that Google Assistant will arrive in the form of a stand-alone app for iOS, Apple’s mobile operating system.
Google Assistant, which the company formally introduced at its annual I/O developer conference 2016, is a contextually aware, anticipatory digital helper with support for third-party apps. It can walk you through recipes, place restaurant reservations, recap the day’s events, and find nearby movie showtimes. And thanks to support for apps like Uber, iHeartRadio, and MyWineGuide, it can summon a car, play internet radio, suggest wine pairings, and more.
It’s designed to be relatable. The Mountain View, California-based company recruited ex-Pixar animator Emma Coats to give the Assistant a personality — and a backstory. “[We] think of the Assistant […] as a conversational assistant — we want users to have an ongoing two-way dialogue,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai said at I/O 2016.
Google hinted at an iOS version of the Assistant earlier this year, at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. “I do not think we have anything to announce,” Google product management director Gummi Hafsteinsson told Geekster, “but I think the general philosophy is that we would like to have the Assistant available to as many people as possible.”
And more recently, Google brought the Assistant to more devices. It came to Android TV, the company’s set-top box platform, in February, and launched on Android Auto in May. And in April, Google introduced the Assistant software development kit (SDK), a suite of tools that let developers plug the Google Assistant into any device that meets a base set of requirements.
The iOS launch comes as Apple prepares to bring its own AI-powered assistant, Siri, to new devices. The Cupertino, California-based company is reportedly prepping a smart home speaker ahead of a June launch at its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC). It’s said to have built-in controls, a far-field microphone array capable of detecting voices from across the room, high-end speakers with Beats technology, and integration with Apple’s smart home platform, HomeKit. It’ll support Apple’s in-home wireless streaming technology, AirPlay, and run a variant of iOS.
Rumors of a Google Assistant app for iOS also follows Amazon’s new Alexa Show, a speaker with a built-in screen and video camera, and Harman Kardon’s Invoke, a high-end stereo powered by Microsoft’s Cortana intelligence.
According to Android Police, the Assistant app for iOS could be announced as soon as next week, at I/O 2017.
Artificially intelligent Google Assistant could soon join Siri on iOS devices
Why it matters to you
Pretty soon, you won’t need to choose between Siri and Google Assistant. iOS users could get the best of both worlds.
The artificial intelligence behind the Google Home speaker and Google’s Allo messing app could come to the iPhone within “days.” That’s according to an Android Police, which claims that Google Assistant will arrive in the form of a stand-alone app for iOS, Apple’s mobile operating system.
Google Assistant, which the company formally introduced at its annual I/O developer conference 2016, is a contextually aware, anticipatory digital helper with support for third-party apps. It can walk you through recipes, place restaurant reservations, recap the day’s events, and find nearby movie showtimes. And thanks to support for apps like Uber, iHeartRadio, and MyWineGuide, it can summon a car, play internet radio, suggest wine pairings, and more.
It’s designed to be relatable. The Mountain View, California-based company recruited ex-Pixar animator Emma Coats to give the Assistant a personality — and a backstory. “[We] think of the Assistant […] as a conversational assistant — we want users to have an ongoing two-way dialogue,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai said at I/O 2016.
Google hinted at an iOS version of the Assistant earlier this year, at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. “I do not think we have anything to announce,” Google product management director Gummi Hafsteinsson told Geekster, “but I think the general philosophy is that we would like to have the Assistant available to as many people as possible.”
And more recently, Google brought the Assistant to more devices. It came to Android TV, the company’s set-top box platform, in February, and launched on Android Auto in May. And in April, Google introduced the Assistant software development kit (SDK), a suite of tools that let developers plug the Google Assistant into any device that meets a base set of requirements.
The iOS launch comes as Apple prepares to bring its own AI-powered assistant, Siri, to new devices. The Cupertino, California-based company is reportedly prepping a smart home speaker ahead of a June launch at its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC). It’s said to have built-in controls, a far-field microphone array capable of detecting voices from across the room, high-end speakers with Beats technology, and integration with Apple’s smart home platform, HomeKit. It’ll support Apple’s in-home wireless streaming technology, AirPlay, and run a variant of iOS.
Rumors of a Google Assistant app for iOS also follows Amazon’s new Alexa Show, a speaker with a built-in screen and video camera, and Harman Kardon’s Invoke, a high-end stereo powered by Microsoft’s Cortana intelligence.
According to Android Police, the Assistant app for iOS could be announced as soon as next week, at I/O 2017.
The mythical Intel Core i9 processor might be real and arriving soon
Why it matters to you
That high-end desktop PC you’re planning to build later this year just got an incredibly powerful option, but you will likely need to save up some money.
The Intel Core i9 processor has been something of a unicorn over the past several years, popping up periodically in rumors and generating some hope that Intel would crank up the performance even higher. Now, another rumor has arrived that appears to give some additional credence to the impending release of another level of Core CPU.
The news came via a post on the Anandtech forums, which included an image of a slide that shows off the next generation of Intel processors. These would be based on the LGA-2066 architecture, and if valid, would create a strong lineup of high-end desktop CPUs, Techspot reports.
According to the image, the new Core i9 designation would refer to four different chips ranging from the Core i9-7800X up to the Core i9-7920X. These chips would have a minimum of six cores and 12 threads and would range in speed from a 3.5GHz base and 4.0GHz Turbo 2.0 up to an undisclosed maximum speed. Between 28 and 44 PCIe lanes would be supported and the thermal design power (TDP) would run at a scorching 140 watts.
Sweeper/Anandtech
The image is a little difficult to read and so here are all of the specifications for the upcoming high-end Skylake-X and Kaby Lake-X processors:
Processor
Cores/ Threads
Base Clock/ Turbo (GHz)
PCIe Lanes
RAM
TDP
Core i7-7640K (Kaby Lake-X)
4/4
4.0/4.2
16
2 X DDR4-2666
112W
Core i7-7740K (Kaby Lake-X)
4/8
4.3/4.5
16
2 X DDR4-2666
112W
Core i9-7800X (Skylake-X)
6/12
3.5/4.0
28
4 X DDR4-2666
140W
Core i9-7820X (Skylake-X)
8/16
4.3/4.5
28
4 X DDR4-2666
140W
Core i9-7900X (Skylake-X)
10/20
3.3/4.5
44
4 X DDR4-2666
140W
Core i9-7920X (Skylake-X)
12/24
TBD
44
4 X DDR4-2666
140W
Clearly, Intel is looking to maintain its dominance at the high-end of the desktop CPU market and it is not hesitating to push the power envelope while it is at it. While the new chips show a launch date starting in June, with the most powerful Core i9-7920X slated to launch in August, we do not have pricing information yet. There is no doubt, however, that this level of performance will not be what most people define as “affordable.”
Delta may soon allow you to use your face to check your bags
Why it matters to you
Studies show self-service bag drops could help speed up the check-in process at airports.
Waiting to check bags at best is frustrating, and at worst can make you miss your flight. If you ever thought you could do it by yourself, Delta may soon give you the chance to try it out. This summer, Delta will begin testing self-service bag drop machines, and one of the machines is being equipped with facial recognition technology.
There is scant information on how the machines could work, but it will involve a customer’s face being scanned to match it to the passport photo associated with the ticket to verify identity. A digital rendering of the machines shows an opening where the bags will presumably be taken to be sorted once you are done checking them. The first test will occur this summer at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
Delta aims for these machines to enable you to check your own bags, which should mean the machines will weigh the luggage and allow you to pay any associated fees directly from the machine, although that was not specified. Delta hopes these types of machines will help more than just the customers who use them. “We see a future where Delta agents will be freed up to seek out travelers and deliver more proactive and thoughtful customer service.” said Gareth Joyce, Delta’s senior vice president of airport customer service and cargo, in a press release announcing the news.
While Delta wants to use your face to help you check your bags quicker, it will not be the first. Napoli International Airport in Italy recently implemented Rockwell Collins’ M Series Plus self-service bag drop machines. The machines allow customers to weigh and tag their bags, as well as pay. There is no facial recognition technology used, so identity verification is handled the old-fashioned way with passport/ID scanners. So far, EasyJet is the only airline that is using the machines at the airport.
Self-service bag drops may be the future, but other airlines have recently begun implementing facial recognition to keep customers safe. Ottawa International Airport began implementing facial recognition in kiosks to verify a traveler’s identity this spring. Last year, John F. Kennedy International Airport started using facial recognition to help verify the identity of travelers using electronic passports.
Delta will use the feedback it gets during the trial run of these self-bag-drop machines to see how much they help. Let’s hope the face of bag checking is about to change.
>>>>>>> h-dtwp-2254-4
Delta may soon allow you to use your face to check your bags
Why it matters to you
Studies show self-service bag drops could help speed up the check-in process at airports.
Waiting to check bags at best is frustrating, and at worst can make you miss your flight. If you ever thought you could do it by yourself, Delta may soon give you the chance to try it out. This summer, Delta will begin testing self-service bag drop machines, and one of the machines is being equipped with facial recognition technology.
There is scant information on how the machines could work, but it will involve a customer’s face being scanned to match it to the passport photo associated with the ticket to verify identity. A digital rendering of the machines shows an opening where the bags will presumably be taken to be sorted once you are done checking them. The first test will occur this summer at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
Delta aims for these machines to enable you to check your own bags, which should mean the machines will weigh the luggage and allow you to pay any associated fees directly from the machine, although that was not specified. Delta hopes these types of machines will help more than just the customers who use them. “We see a future where Delta agents will be freed up to seek out travelers and deliver more proactive and thoughtful customer service.” said Gareth Joyce, Delta’s senior vice president of airport customer service and cargo, in a press release announcing the news.
While Delta wants to use your face to help you check your bags quicker, it will not be the first. Napoli International Airport in Italy recently implemented Rockwell Collins’ M Series Plus self-service bag drop machines. The machines allow customers to weigh and tag their bags, as well as pay. There is no facial recognition technology used, so identity verification is handled the old-fashioned way with passport/ID scanners. So far, EasyJet is the only airline that is using the machines at the airport.
Self-service bag drops may be the future, but other airlines have recently begun implementing facial recognition to keep customers safe. Ottawa International Airport began implementing facial recognition in kiosks to verify a traveler’s identity this spring. Last year, John F. Kennedy International Airport started using facial recognition to help verify the identity of travelers using electronic passports.
Delta will use the feedback it gets during the trial run of these self-bag-drop machines to see how much they help. Let’s hope the face of bag checking is about to change.
>>>>>>> h-dtwp-2254-4
Samsung Chromebook Pro went up for pre-order on Amazon, quickly sold out
Why it matters to you
Anyone eager to get their hands on a Samsung Chromebook Pro will be pleased to know that the system is set to launch before the end of May.
We have known that Samsung’s Chromebook Pro was going to be one of the more compelling laptop releases of the year for some time, with the system beating the Asus Chromebook Flip C302A by a hair in a recent Digital Trends face-off. Now we know that the device is inbound very, very soon.
The Samsung Chromebook Pro will start shipping on May 28, according to a product description posted on Amazon. The system is now out of stock but managed to rise to the No. 1 best seller spot on the retailer’s listing of 2-in-1 computers when it was briefly available earlier on Monday.
It is clear that there is a frothing demand for this particular piece of hardware. Chromebooks have seen their popularity grow steadily since the line was introduced in 2011 and the fact that Google added support for Android apps to Chrome OS earlier in 2017 has only made these laptops more appealing.
Samsung spared no effort to make sure its 2017 Chromebooks took full advantage of this new functionality. The team behind the laptops worked with Google engineers to ensure that Android apps work great on the Chromebook Pro and its sibling the Chromebook Plus and its multi-touch display and support for motion controls ensure that the experience is just as good as on an Android smartphone.
There is currently no word on whether Amazon will get more stock of the Chromebook Pro. However, with the laptop set to launch before the end of May — having already suffered a significant delay, given that it was expected to make its debut in April — it would follow that the retailer would want to make more stock available on or around its release date.
If you already consigned yourself to refreshing Amazon until more Chromebook Pros are made available, here’s a link to its product page.
Robotic pool shark wants to school you at billiards — and you can build one
Why it matters to you
This awesome robot pool shark could one day be the centerpiece of our dream games room.
Like most of us, engineer Ben Varvil has modest goals in life: A good job to keep his mind active, and an awesome robot buddy to play billiards against. An ongoing project called “Judith” helps with both of those ambitions — and especially the latter.
“Judith is a pool-playing robot project I enjoy developing in my spare time,” Varvil told Digital Trends. “I teach high school engineering classes, so having a side project like this keeps me sharp and able to contribute relevant programming, making and problem-solving content to my students. I believe anyone who has ever played pool has had the moment of thought, ‘This is just geometry.’ When I had that moment, my mind went immediately to, ‘If this is just geometry, then machine control should be able to make quick work of the game and have no problem beating a human.’ This thinking inspired me to begin the project.”
Thus far Judith is a miniature-scale mockup, showing off the radically different, servo-assisted take Varvil has imagined on a traditional pool table. Because of the challenge of moving a wheeled or tracked robot around the base of a regular table, he designed a legless pedestal table the robot can be attached to and swing around in a giant circle to take its shots. The robot even tucks away neatly under the table when it is not in use.
Varvil is also working on an algorithm that will allow the pool-shooting robot to compete against human players. He already developed a system for determining pool ball identity and location data through an Arduino serial terminal. The goal next is to utilize code which finds all the possible shots and then selects the best one to attempt.
“The super fantasy dream is to make a reliable shooting system that can execute shot commands and to then educate anyone interested in the ways of controlling the robot,” he continued. “From there, those people can write and then test strategic pool playing algorithms to complete with humans. Where as [IBM] Watson took a team of engineers to win Jeopardy, and Deep Blue took who-knows-what to beat humans in chess, Judith feels like a way for the everyday person to join the human versus robot game.”
While the project is currently unfinished, Varvil has made the construction details for building the miniature table available on the website Instructables. Now he ha applied for the role of “Artist in Residence” at the maker studio, which will give him the opportunity to build a life-size model to take it to the next level.
Never miss out on a great story with these read-it-later apps
We’ve all been there: You see an interesting headline, but you don’t have the time to dig in. Hopefully, you don’t forget to look for it in the future — but even if you remember, tracking it down again could be tricky. Fortunately, there are read-it-later apps designed specifically for this problem.
Read-it-later apps are a simple concept. They serve as hubs for all the articles and links you’d like to set aside for future reading. Although bookmarking is commonplace in nearly every browser, the most avid news aficionados can certainly benefit from the extra features these apps offer.
For example, the best read-it-later apps allow you to tailor the experience to your liking by customizing font styles and sizes, as well as colors and themes. They strip away some invasive ads and help you focus on the content you want to see, for a more comfortable and appealing format. They also allow you to save content for offline viewing, so you can take your saved articles anywhere.
Recently, many read-it-later apps have also added light social functionality as well, allowing you to share articles with friends who also use the service. Some even encourage you to curate your own list of links that other users can follow.
So which are the best? There a ton of content-sharing and pinning platforms out there, but only a few actually nail the basics. Here are some of our favorites — though your mileage may vary depending on your usage habits and the kinds of devices you own.
Pocket is one of the leaders in this space, and for good reason. Having been around the longest, it boasts the most comprehensive feature set in the segment. There’s support for a boatload of RSS and news apps, as well as a feature that will automatically detect URLs on the clipboard so they’re easier to add. You can also follow companies and individuals within the app if you’d like, and their contributions will be shown in your Recommendations tab for easy access.
Pocket’s most useful feature, however, is its organization system, which operates by tagging articles with searchable terms. If you’re using Pocket for research purposes, it will help keep everything in order.
Mac users will appreciate Pocket’s dedicated desktop version, which works the same way as the mobile app. Unfortunately, there’s no such app for Windows or Linux users. Extensions exist for various browsers, though, so at the very least you can still save content no matter what operating system you’re running.
Pocket can be downloaded for free, though, the premium version ($5 a month, or $45 a year) obliterates ads and expands search abilities. It also gives you a permanent library that retains a copy of saved content even if it has been taken offline, and provides tag suggestions.
Download now for:
iOS Android
Instapaper
Alongside Pocket, Instapaper is the other half of the read-it-later duopoly. Although its feature set matches Pocket on paper, it does feel like a different app in practice. Whereas Pocket might be a bit easier to grasp at first, with a more intuitive and colorful card-based interface, Instapaper boasts a more stoic aesthetic and focuses first and foremost on the reading experience.
No other app on this list boasts the same breadth of customization options; in addition to being able to manipulate basic formatting, you can change the width of the margins, line spacing, and set custom screen brightness specifically for the app. What’s more, Instapaper allows you to highlight text and provide annotations, and there’s even a speed reading mode that flashes the article’s text on screen at a chosen words-per-minute rate.
Instapaper’s method of content organization utilizes folders, rather than Pocket’s tags. While it works nearly the same, articles can only be placed in one folder at a time, and after they’re moved, they’re no longer present in the main feed. Depending on your usage, you may find this limiting.
Where Instapaper makes up some considerable ground is in its pricing — or rather, complete lack thereof. The app was formerly sold on a model similar to Pocket’s, with an optional monthly or yearly cost. After Pinterest purchased the company last fall, however, the premium iteration of the app was made standard for all users. This means Instapaper is now completely ad-free.
Download now for:
iOS Android
Shout
Shout is the newest app on our list, so it doesn’t quite match the extensive feature set of either Pocket or Instapaper. However, if collaboration and sharing are important to you, Shout could be your new go-to app. The app is currently only available on iOS and in the desktop version of Chrome.
That said, using the mobile version couldn’t be easier. Simply send the link in question to Shout from the iOS sharing menu, like you would any other app. Without leaving your browser, you can easily title and categorize the content, almost as if you were composing a Facebook post or tweet.
Within Shout, you can set certain lists as public or collaborative, so other users can see or even add to them. That’s a huge benefit, particularly for students or teams pooling information together for projects. You can also easily send email digests of lists to your followers with just a swipe and tap.
It must be said that Shout lacks the customizable, reader-friendly view of the previous two apps — it’s really just meant for curating content in lists exactly as it comes. For users who demand a consistent visual style, or one they can tailor to their comfort level, Shout isn’t the best option. But in terms of sharing and productivity, it’s one of the more promising apps available.
Download now for:
iOS Chrome
Amazon Kindle
A recent update to the iOS version of Amazon’s Kindle app added “Send to Kindle” functionality to Safari — a feature that had existed on Android devices and various desktop browsers for quite some time. With it, Kindle could become your makeshift read-it-later app.
Now, it goes without saying that Kindle was not designed to be a read-it-later app in the strictest sense, so it does lack the sharing and organization features that make the previous three examples stand out. However, if you already own Kindle devices and are heavily invested in the ecosystem, using Amazon’s app for such a purpose makes a lot of sense.
For one, you’ll be able to read articles on the very same tablets and e-readers you may already use for books — so just for the sake of convenience, there’s an argument to be made. Second, Kindle already boasts powerful formatting, customization, and annotation tools, and these can be used for articles and documents as well. That said, you may run into problems with video and other types of media.
Download now for:
iOS Android
Safari Reading List / Chrome
Here’s an option that couldn’t be easier to start using right away, depending on your smartphone or tablet. For iOS and MacOS users, Safari’s Reading List allows you to store articles and quickly view them in a reader-friendly format with a single tap. Apple has even provided a selection of fonts, as well as the ability to change sizes and the background color.
Reading List also supports embedded YouTube videos and practically any type of media Safari supports, so you shouldn’t run into any compatibility issues. The only significant downside is that, since it’s built into Safari, there’s nothing in the way of organization or tagging — just the ability to mark pages as read. Given it loads every site, you also won’t be able to save links for offline viewing. For these reasons, Reading List is an incomplete solution compared to what Pocket and Instapaper offer.
Chrome for Android allows users to download pages for offline viewing — proving as a bare bones alternative for people who don’t want to install a separate app.
AIVAnet 