In a world saturated in Wi-Fi, there’s still room for Bluetooth Mesh

Yes, current Wi-Fi-based smart home technology can turn on the lights with your smartphone or voice. But do you call that home automation, really? Isn’t it just a slightly more convenient light switch?

How about this? When you unlock your front door, the lights in the foyer come on, the motion sensors on your alarm system turn off, the thermostat starts the air conditioning, and your entertainment system begins playing your favorite music—all before you put your keys down!

Now that’s home automation, right?

What about a more serious, or potentially life-and-death scenario, where hospital staff could track patients, staff members, and equipment from any console, PC, or tablet on the premises?

While Wi-Fi has allowed us to take baby steps into building automation, wireless security, asset tracking, and more, a new technology called Bluetooth Mesh — an update to the standard Bluetooth wireless solution that most of us know — promises a better, more efficient, and much less expensive solution.

“As peoples’ expectations for networks go up, … [they] won’t put up with flaky Wi-Fi anymore.”

“As peoples’ expectations for networks go up, they demand networks capable of handling hundreds (or thousands) of IP addresses, offering Wi-Fi-level of signal performance across the house and building,” Daniel Cooley, Senior Vice President of Silicon Labs, told Digital Trends. “People won’t put up with flaky Wi-Fi anymore. If they can get away with fewer antennas, it would be much better.”

Cooley is a member of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, or SIG, which oversees and develops Bluetooth technology. If he’s right—and industry watchers and makers of networking equipment are betting that he is—many aspects of our lives will soon be secured and simplified by this latest Bluetooth update.

Not your father’s Bluetooth

Traditional wireless networks, including one-to-one Bluetooth networks, are limited by distance between the two devices communicating. Wi-Fi makes that worse with an additional impediment—relatively high-power requirements. It’s difficult to make a Wi-Fi signal extend more than a few hundred feet without a massive antenna and large power supply.

Bluetooth Mesh devices find a clever way to fix that.  They connect to each other, and pass signals to peers that are within range, forming a web, or mesh, of interconnected devices capable of relaying data. This means that information is passed from one device to another, and another, and so on.

This “managed flood” approach to data transmission, according to the Bluetooth SIG, “is uniquely suited for low-power wireless mesh networks, especially those handling a significant amount of multicast traffic.”

“Multicast” is a form of network communication where a single sender broadcasts to multiple receivers. In a “flood network,” every device in the chain, or mesh, is multicasting to every device within its range, and so on. That creates a reliable network without the need for massive power draw or a big, beefy antennas.

How Bluetooth Mesh works

An important component of the Bluetooth protocol is its Generic Access Profile, or GAP, which controls how Bluetooth devices scan, broadcast, and connect to their peers. Until Bluetooth Mesh, GAP had a typical parent-child network relationship, where the parent did all the routing, and the child performed its allotted task. That’s what happens when you connect a Bluetooth keyboard to your tablet, for example.

Bluetooth mesh will work hand-in-hand with Wi-Fi, with the latter continuing to serve high-bandwidth needs.

Starting with Bluetooth 4.1, GAP broadened its networking abilities. Bluetooth devices gained the ability to play the roles of both parent and child, giving all devices the ability to connect and broadcast to any peer directly. This worked with all devices in their transmission range, as well as devices out of range. The ability to connect directly or indirectly with any number of mesh-capable devices allows for the construction of elaborate mesh networks consisting of many devices over several miles. If every device in the network is within broadcast range of at least one other device, the mesh network can cover potentially unlimited distances.

The lower power requirements and small size of individual Bluetooth devices in the mesh makes it possible to tuck them away in other devices. For example, they could piggyback on lighting systems.

“Within the building automation market, there is a growing focus on connected lighting and the role it can play as a platform for providing automation services throughout a facility,” said Szymon Slupik, President and CTO of Silvair, a company that builds Bluetooth Mesh lighting components (including mesh lightbulbs). “A smart lighting platform built on top of Bluetooth mesh networking can also support asset tracking, point of interest, and way-finding services.”

Silvair is a pioneer in Bluetooth-based smart lighting technologies and a major contributor to the Bluetooth SIG’s Mesh Working Group.

Bluetooth Mesh networks are not only low-power, but they’re also low-bandwidth. That might sound like a problem, but it’s not. A Bluetooth Mesh network is aimed to move data that maintains connectivity or sends commands. Sending a “turn off” or “turn on” command doesn’t require much bandwidth. That’s why Mesh isn’t being pitched as a full Wi-Fi replacement. It’s similar from a distance, but on close inspection, it fits a different niche.

When it comes to home-mesh networking, though, Bluetooth is not the only game in town, and for some applications there are probably better fits. Linksys, for example, has released its own mesh networking products for high-speed data transfers based on Wi-Fi. Why?

According to Justin Doucette, Senior Director of Product Management at Linksys, “If you are paying for 100 Mbps from your Internet service provider, then you want to get all that speed in every corner of your house.” This means Mesh will work hand-in-hand with Wi-Fi, with the latter continuing to serve high-bandwidth needs.

A world with or without Mesh networks

Often, protocols and their subsequent solutions have a potential to change the world, or at least parts of it. And while there’s no way to predict that Bluetooth Mesh will have as big an influence as we suspect, it seems that this new protocol has far-reaching potential.

Bluetooth is already a vastly deployed, trusted protocol, with a lot of goodwill behind it. If all goes well, and it works as it is said to, we’re in for a drastic change in network technology, and what it can do.

In a world saturated in Wi-Fi, there’s still room for Bluetooth Mesh

Yes, current Wi-Fi-based smart home technology can turn on the lights with your smartphone or voice. But do you call that home automation, really? Isn’t it just a slightly more convenient light switch?

How about this? When you unlock your front door, the lights in the foyer come on, the motion sensors on your alarm system turn off, the thermostat starts the air conditioning, and your entertainment system begins playing your favorite music—all before you put your keys down!

Now that’s home automation, right?

What about a more serious, or potentially life-and-death scenario, where hospital staff could track patients, staff members, and equipment from any console, PC, or tablet on the premises?

While Wi-Fi has allowed us to take baby steps into building automation, wireless security, asset tracking, and more, a new technology called Bluetooth Mesh — an update to the standard Bluetooth wireless solution that most of us know — promises a better, more efficient, and much less expensive solution.

“As peoples’ expectations for networks go up, … [they] won’t put up with flaky Wi-Fi anymore.”

“As peoples’ expectations for networks go up, they demand networks capable of handling hundreds (or thousands) of IP addresses, offering Wi-Fi-level of signal performance across the house and building,” Daniel Cooley, Senior Vice President of Silicon Labs, told Digital Trends. “People won’t put up with flaky Wi-Fi anymore. If they can get away with fewer antennas, it would be much better.”

Cooley is a member of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, or SIG, which oversees and develops Bluetooth technology. If he’s right—and industry watchers and makers of networking equipment are betting that he is—many aspects of our lives will soon be secured and simplified by this latest Bluetooth update.

Not your father’s Bluetooth

Traditional wireless networks, including one-to-one Bluetooth networks, are limited by distance between the two devices communicating. Wi-Fi makes that worse with an additional impediment—relatively high-power requirements. It’s difficult to make a Wi-Fi signal extend more than a few hundred feet without a massive antenna and large power supply.

Bluetooth Mesh devices find a clever way to fix that.  They connect to each other, and pass signals to peers that are within range, forming a web, or mesh, of interconnected devices capable of relaying data. This means that information is passed from one device to another, and another, and so on.

This “managed flood” approach to data transmission, according to the Bluetooth SIG, “is uniquely suited for low-power wireless mesh networks, especially those handling a significant amount of multicast traffic.”

“Multicast” is a form of network communication where a single sender broadcasts to multiple receivers. In a “flood network,” every device in the chain, or mesh, is multicasting to every device within its range, and so on. That creates a reliable network without the need for massive power draw or a big, beefy antennas.

How Bluetooth Mesh works

An important component of the Bluetooth protocol is its Generic Access Profile, or GAP, which controls how Bluetooth devices scan, broadcast, and connect to their peers. Until Bluetooth Mesh, GAP had a typical parent-child network relationship, where the parent did all the routing, and the child performed its allotted task. That’s what happens when you connect a Bluetooth keyboard to your tablet, for example.

Bluetooth mesh will work hand-in-hand with Wi-Fi, with the latter continuing to serve high-bandwidth needs.

Starting with Bluetooth 4.1, GAP broadened its networking abilities. Bluetooth devices gained the ability to play the roles of both parent and child, giving all devices the ability to connect and broadcast to any peer directly. This worked with all devices in their transmission range, as well as devices out of range. The ability to connect directly or indirectly with any number of mesh-capable devices allows for the construction of elaborate mesh networks consisting of many devices over several miles. If every device in the network is within broadcast range of at least one other device, the mesh network can cover potentially unlimited distances.

The lower power requirements and small size of individual Bluetooth devices in the mesh makes it possible to tuck them away in other devices. For example, they could piggyback on lighting systems.

“Within the building automation market, there is a growing focus on connected lighting and the role it can play as a platform for providing automation services throughout a facility,” said Szymon Slupik, President and CTO of Silvair, a company that builds Bluetooth Mesh lighting components (including mesh lightbulbs). “A smart lighting platform built on top of Bluetooth mesh networking can also support asset tracking, point of interest, and way-finding services.”

Silvair is a pioneer in Bluetooth-based smart lighting technologies and a major contributor to the Bluetooth SIG’s Mesh Working Group.

Bluetooth Mesh networks are not only low-power, but they’re also low-bandwidth. That might sound like a problem, but it’s not. A Bluetooth Mesh network is aimed to move data that maintains connectivity or sends commands. Sending a “turn off” or “turn on” command doesn’t require much bandwidth. That’s why Mesh isn’t being pitched as a full Wi-Fi replacement. It’s similar from a distance, but on close inspection, it fits a different niche.

When it comes to home-mesh networking, though, Bluetooth is not the only game in town, and for some applications there are probably better fits. Linksys, for example, has released its own mesh networking products for high-speed data transfers based on Wi-Fi. Why?

According to Justin Doucette, Senior Director of Product Management at Linksys, “If you are paying for 100 Mbps from your Internet service provider, then you want to get all that speed in every corner of your house.” This means Mesh will work hand-in-hand with Wi-Fi, with the latter continuing to serve high-bandwidth needs.

A world with or without Mesh networks

Often, protocols and their subsequent solutions have a potential to change the world, or at least parts of it. And while there’s no way to predict that Bluetooth Mesh will have as big an influence as we suspect, it seems that this new protocol has far-reaching potential.

Bluetooth is already a vastly deployed, trusted protocol, with a lot of goodwill behind it. If all goes well, and it works as it is said to, we’re in for a drastic change in network technology, and what it can do.

Acer Aspire 5 review

Research Center:
Acer Aspire 5

There’s no doubt that the Windows PC ecosystem is incredibly strong at the high-end. A host of machines are available at price points starting at $1000, but not everybody wants or needs to spend so much for a PC. All-metal chassis, daylong battery life, and stunning 4K UHD displays are nice, but the fact is that these machines are well outside of many peoples’ budgets. Our Acer Aspire 5 review brings things back down to earth and looks at whether more affordable laptops can provide decent quality.

Just a few years ago, budget laptops were made of creaky plastic and suffered from underwhelming performance thanks to low-end processors, RAM, and storage. Things have improved considerably since, and today PC manufacturers are delivering high-quality options for $700 or less.

The Aspire 5 review unit that Acer provided is a case in point, offering up a 15.6-inch non-touch 1080p display, seventh-generation Intel Core i5-7200U processor, discrete Nvidia MX150 GPU, 8GB of DDR4 RAM, and a 256GB SATA solid-state drive (SSD) for $600. Lesser configurations go for as little as $400.

The question is, did Acer cut too many corners to bring in such a reasonably priced machine?

An unassuming design that prefers plastic

When you’re paying $600 for a 15.6-inch notebook, you probably shouldn’t expect an ultra-thin all-metal chassis – and you’re not getting that with the Acer Aspire 5. Instead, the machine sports a moderately thin chassis, at 0.85 inches thick, that’s constructed almost entirely of plastic, with the metal keyboard deck being the sole exception.

While metal always feels more premium, the use of plastic makes sense here. Carrying the Aspire 5 around the house or office inspires confidence, thanks to a tight build that doesn’t exhibit the creaks and moans that once accompanied affordable laptops. You won’t be left feeling you spent too little cash.

Bill Roberson/Digital Trends

Bill Roberson/Digital Trends

Bill Roberson/Digital Trends

Bill Roberson/Digital Trends

As further testament to the Aspire 5’s build quality, the hinge was smooth, the display stayed in place during use, and there was minimal keyboard flex. The only real concern with the laptop’s build quality was with the lid, which warped too easily with light pressure. We suggest you don’t sit anything heavy on top of it.

In style, the Aspire 5 won’t be winning any beauty contests. It’s an attractive black color with the silver plastic Acer logo, a slight chrome along the edge of the keyboard deck, and the silver hinge cover offering the only splashes of color. It’s an unassuming laptop, but again, you likely shouldn’t expect a $600 laptop stocked with midrange components to stand out in the budget crowd.

All the connectivity you expect and deserve

Given the Acer Aspire 5’s relative thickness compared to thin and light laptops, you have plenty of good reason to expect solid connectivity. Fortunately, Acer delivers, with a solid complement of ports that support both the past and the future.

Along the left-hand side you’ll find an RJ-45 Ethernet port, a USB 3.1 Type-C Gen1 port supporting up to 5Gb/s, a full-size HDMI port, a USB 3.0 Type-A port that supports power-off charging, and an SD card reader. On the right-hand side, there are two USB 2.0 Type-A ports to go along with the dedicated charging port and a 3.5mm headphone jack.

The keyboard and touchpad neither add nor detract

The Acer Aspire 5’s keyboard is a standard island version with a full-size layout including a 10-key numeric keypad. All the keys are in the usual places and are of average size, except for the arrow keys, which are significantly smaller than most. Nevertheless, getting up and typing on the laptop’s keyboard is a fast and straightforward affair. Note that the keyboard isn’t backlit, but the white-on-black lettering is visible in all but darkest environments.

You won’t find the Aspire 5’s keyboard or touchpad holding you back from getting your work done.

In terms of typing feel, the key mechanisms are nothing special. They’re not so soft or unresponsive that they deserve to be labeled as “mushy,” nor are they particularly snappy or precise. Key travel is sufficient to avoid bottoming out, and the keys are quiet and relatively consistent.

The touchpad is better than you’d think, and it indicates just how far Windows PC touchpads have come. Where MacBooks used to be heads and shoulders above many Windows laptops, that’s just no longer the case. Even the Acer Aspire 5, at its budget price, packs in a touchpad that’s decently large, plenty responsive enough, and supports Microsoft’s Precision Touchpad protocol. Gestures are smooth, and all those recognized by Windows 10 will work here.

There’s no touch display or pen input support with the Acer Aspire 5. In that respect, it’s very old-school. Still, you won’t find its keyboard or touchpad holding you back.

No other way to put it — the display is just bad

A few short years ago, a 1080p 15.6-inch display was a high-end specification, and finding one in a budget laptop was a virtual impossibility. Today it’s not hard to obtain, but most machines at this price point are still running with 720p displays. The 1080p panel in this Acer is a huge step up over that, providing a sharper image at a low price. However, it does have its flaws.

Hooking up our colorimeter and running our standard suite of tests left us decidedly underwhelmed. The panel that Asus put into our review Aspire 5 is severely lacking in a few key areas. First, color support is limited at 41 percent of the AdobeRGB color gamut, and 55 percent of sRGB.

Looking at some other relatively budget laptops in our comparison group, that’s a poor result, but not remarkable. The similarly priced 13.3-inch Asus Zenbook UX330UA is the standout here. Note that the Aspire 5’s color accuracy was second worst at 7.36 (1.0 or less is preferable) with only Dell’s Inspiron 15 7000 budget gaming system achieving a lower score.

Next, contrast came in at an astonishingly low 70:1 at full brightness, compared to 940:1 with the Asus Zenbook UX330UA and 530:1 with Acer’s Swift 3. Only the Inspiron 15 7000 came close. Gamma was also poor at 2.5, meaning that the display will tend toward being way too dark. Finally, the screen was also extremely dim at just 181 nits, which is too low for comfortable use in any bright environment even given the matte display.

Bill Roberson/Digital Trends

In practice, the display didn’t look quite as bad as these numbers indicate, but that’s damning with faint praise. Video tended to be too dark, blacks were crushed, and colors were muted. To top it all off, viewing angles were poor, with the display becoming washed out at anything other than close to dead center.

The display is clearly an area where Acer cut a major corner to bring the machine in at a low price, and it detracts from the laptop’s attractiveness for anyone who wants to view photos or watch video on the large screen. At least it’s 1080p.

Sound quality is good enough for sharing

The Acer Aspire 5 has two downward firing speakers located toward the front of the chassis, and they put out sufficiently loud and clear sound for sharing YouTube videos with a small group of friends. Bass was lacking, and the high end was a bit too prominent, resulting in music that was lacking in any warmth. We’d rate audio as sufficient but not at all exceptional.

Solid performance for the price

Acer managed to include a seventh-generation Core i5-7200U processor in the Aspire 5, promising decent productivity performance. The 8GB of DDR4 RAM included is also a plus, and good to see at this price point.

Unsurprisingly, the Aspire 5 performed reasonably well in our benchmarks. In Geekbench 4, the machine scored 3,645 in the single-core test, and 7,090 in the multi-core test. That’s right in line with the comparison systems utilizing dual-core Core i5-7200U processors. The Dell Inspiron 15 7000 scored much higher in the multi-core test thanks to its Core i5-7300HQ quad-core processor.

On our more aggressive Handbrake test, which provides an idea of real-word performance by converting a 420GB .MP4 video to x.265, the Aspire 5 again scored right in line with most similarly equipped laptops by completing the test in 1,076 seconds. The Asus Zenbook UX330UA fell down a little here, taking 1,445 seconds, while the Inspiron 15 7000 again excelled at 460 seconds.

The Aspire 5’s number are great at this price point. Thermal management was also good when we pushed the processor, with fans that never seemed louder than just audible during our processor benchmarks. Most people would find the Aspire 5 to provide perfectly acceptable performance for all but the most demanding processor-based tasks, and unless that’s your main priority, this is a reasonable budget choice.

An SSD is nice to have, even if it’s only SATA

Many budget laptops get by with a mechanical hard disk drive (HDD) serving up the long-term storage – although that’s starting to change. Seeing an SSD of any kind at this price point is welcome, and Acer obliged by offering up a 256GB Hynix SATA model. That doesn’t promise the best storage performance compared to much-faster PCIe NVMe SSDs — check out why PCIe NVME drives are preferable — but solid performance should be obtainable.

As it turns out, the Aspire 5 performed right in line with our expectations. Its scores of 473 megabytes per second in the CrystalDiskMark read test, and 244 MB/s in the write test, which is what we’ve come to expect from some SATA SSDs. It’s slower by a fair margin than our comparison machines using PCIe SSDs, certainly, but even the ultra-expensive Microsoft Surface Laptop garnered similar scores at almost twice the price in its least expensive model.

In practice, the Acer Aspire 5 boots quickly enough and it opens applications without delay. Saving data is equally fast, meaning that storage won’t be a real bottleneck for most uses. It’s not as fast in terms of storage speeds as the fastest laptops you can buy today, but for most people, the Aspire 5 should be fast enough. Note that it’s also easier to upgrade storage than with some systems, providing welcome flexibility.

A little bit of game, thanks to Nvidia’s latest entry-level mobile GPU

Acer includes an Nvidia’s discrete mobile GPU, the MX150, in the Aspire 5, as a nod to casual gaming. As a replacement for the GTX 940M series of mobile GPUs that you’ll find in many systems today, the MX150 is intended to provide marginally better gaming performance than integrated graphics, and to help boost productivity tasks, like editing video.

Our benchmark tests confirmed that, for the most part, the MX150 does indeed slot in between integrated HD 620 graphics and the 940MX. For example, the Acer Inspire 5 scored 3,165 in the 3DMark Fire Strike test, compared to the HP Spectre x360 15’s 1,939 scored. The Nvidia GTX 1050 Ti in the Dell Inspiron 15 7000 was twice again as fast as the MX150. As expected, the laptops using Intel’s HD 520 integrated graphics were the slowest.

When we ran the Acer Aspire 5 through our usual round of real-life games, the results were mixed. For example, the machine balked at running Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, throwing up an error that we couldn’t diagnose and resolve.

The Acer Aspire 5, with the Nvidia MX150, can get its game on.

In Civilization VI, the laptop’s MX150 maintained an average of 29 frames per second (FPS) in 1080p with medium settings, and 23 FPS with ultra settings. That compared to the 940MX-equipped HP Spectre x360 15 at 34 FPS and 17 FPS respectively. The budget gaming Dell Inspiron 15 1700, with its much stronger GTX 1050 Ti, was significantly faster at 43 FPS and 38 FPS. Unsurprisingly, the Intel HD 620 machine was unplayable at 14 FPS with medium settings.

In Battlefield 1, the Acer Aspire 5 pulled ahead as expected, managing 34 FPS at 1080p with medium settings, and 21 FPS with ultra settings. That beat out the HP Spectre x360 15 at 24 FPS and 17 FPS, and came in well behind the Dell Inspiron 15 1700, which managed a strong 52 FPS and 44 FPS.

Finally, we rounded out our testing with For Honor, where the Acer Aspire was playable, hitting 31 FPS at 1080P with medium setting, but only managed 21 FPS in extreme settings. We haven’t tested For Honor with as many laptops, but for comparison the GTX 1050 Ti-equipped Origin EON15-S scored 71 FPS at medium settings, and 48 FPS at extreme settings. Note that the Aspire 5’s scores make it fine for casual single-player gaming, but you’ll get kicked out of online play if you maintain less than 30 FPS, and the machine barely crossed that barrier in our tests.

The Acer Aspire 5, with the Nvidia MX150, can get its game on, if you’re willing to limit resolution to 1080p, and run at medium settings. That’s superior to machines using Nvidia’s older 940MX, but doesn’t place it in the realm of serious gaming machines. The MX150 also put out a fair bit of heat while gaming, and the Aspire 5’s fans grew loud at times.

A bit chunky, with marginal battery life

The Acer Aspire 5 isn’t the lightest 15.6-inch laptop around at 4.85 pounds, and 0.85 inches thick. It’s not the heaviest or thickest, either. You will notice it in your backpack, but it’s a reasonably portable machine for its price and screen size.

Its 47.5 watt-hour battery, however, isn’t the largest we’ve seen in laptops of similar size. Given its large display with 1080p resolution, and its relatively fast components, we didn’t go into our battery benchmarks with particularly high hopes.

As it turns out, the Acer Aspire 5 provides decent if not outstanding battery life, lasting for three hours and two minutes in our most grueling Basemark test, which runs through a loop of CPU-intensive web pages. That beats out its Acer Swift 3 sibling, and falls in second place compared to the more expensive Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 2.

Performance in our video looping test, which plays a local video until a machine runs out of power, was similar. The Acer Aspire 5 ran for eight hours and 52 minutes, a good but not great score that exceeded only the gaming-focused Dell Inspiron 15 7000’s longevity. The Asus Zenbook UX330UA was the standout here, lasting for an impressive 13 hours and three minutes.

Finally, in our iMacro test that runs a laptop though a series of popular web pages, the Acer Aspire lasted for five hours and 44 minutes. That’s an average score, with the Acer Swift 3 lasting for six hours and 14 minutes, and the Zenbook UX330UA again impressing with a strong 10 hours and 25 minutes.

Acer Aspire 5 Compared To

Origin EON15-S

Asus ROG Zephyrus

HP ZBook Studio G4

Acer Aspire VX 5-591G 5652

Dell XPS 15 9560

Dell Inspiron 15 7000 (2017)

MSI GS63VR 6RF Stealth Pro

Dell Precision 15 3510

Acer Chromebook 15

Toshiba Chromebook 2

Acer Aspire E1

Dell XPS 15 (2013)

Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E530

Lenovo ThinkPad SL400

Gateway M320XL

The Acer Aspire 5 isn’t a terrible performer in this important category, but it’s also not likely to last you a full day’s work away from a charger.

Warranty information

Acer provides that industry standard one-year hardware warranty for the Aspire 5.

Software

Like many budget machines, the Acer Aspire 5 is packed full of extraneous software. Norton Internet Security Trial, Amazon Kindle, Priceline, Dashlane, and a host of Acer and third-party software are all pre-loaded, making this one of the more bogged down systems we’ve tried out lately. In addition, the keyboard deck is festooned with a few stickers that detract from the machine’s otherwise clean lines.

Our Take

Build quality, lightweight gaming performance, and productivity chops are what separate the Acer Aspire 5 from some other budget laptop alternatives. The display sets it back, though, with a dimness and lack of contrast that makes using it far less pleasant than it would be otherwise.

Is there a better alternative?

If you’re dedicated to getting a 15.6-inch display, then the Aspire 5’s 1080p resolution is a real positive. Most 15.6-inch machines in this price range, such as the Dell Inspiron with 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD for $574, are equipped with HD (1,366 x 768) displays. The HP Pavilion 15 with 8GB of RAM and a 1TB HDD comes in at $587 with an HD display, meaning the Aspire is only a few dollars more, but includes a faster SSD and 1080p.

The Dell Inspiron 15 7000 is a gaming system that’s a couple of hundred dollars more expensive, but offers some upgraded gaming performance. And then you could really step up in price and look at the Lenovo Yoga 720 15 with GTX 1050, Intel Core i7-7700HQ quad-core processor, and much better display, for an additional $350.

If you’re willing to step down in size, then the Acer Aspire 5 gets some competition. That comes from smaller 14-inch and 13.3-inch laptops in the same general price range. The Acer Swift 3 and Asus Zenbook UX330UA are machines that are within a hundred dollars or so of the Aspire 5 but offer better — albeit smaller – displays, and a metal chassis. They’re also stuck with Intel HD integrated graphics and won’t play modern games at reasonable settings nearly as well as the Aspire 5.

How long will it last?

With a seventh-generation Core i5 processor and 8GB of RAM, the Acer Aspire 5 should perform well enough to last for at least few years. The ability to easily upgrade RAM and storage is another long-term advantage that could pay dividends down the road. Finally, including a USB Type-C connection is a nod to the future as well.

Should you buy it?

Yes, if you’re strapped for cash and want a large display. The Acer Aspire 5 is an inexpensive 15.6-inch laptop with decent performance and some gaming chops. We have reservations about this laptop, such as the display, which didn’t perform well in our tests. Yet expectations must be managed when considering a laptop around $600. The Aspire 5 has important features, like a fast dual-core processor and a solid state drive, and offers them at a better price than its competitors.

Android Central has teamed up with Zizo to give away a Galaxy Note 8!

Samsung has announced the Galaxy Note 8 and we’re excited to announce that Zizo Wireless is sponsoring a giveaway where one super lucky Android Central is going to win. Keep reading for details!

THE PRIZE: One Android Central reader will win an IOU for the new Samsung Galaxy Note 8 in their choice of available color! Three runners up will each get to choose a Zizo Bolt, ION, or Proton case for the phone 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. Service is not included with the phone and is the responsibility of the winner. We also can’t guarantee the phone works with your carrier, so make sure you check that before you enter. International winners will be responsible for any customs fees incurred during shipping.

The giveaway is open until September 8, 2017, and the winner will be announced right here after the closing date. Good luck!

Android Central is giving away the Samsung Galaxy Note 8! Enter to win now!

Robotic exoskeletons improve mobility for kids with cerebral palsy

Kids with cerebral palsy (CP) can have limited movement (and therefore independence) throughout their lives. Some of them who experience the related set of neurological and movement disorders have what’s called “crouch gait,” which is characterized by excessive bending at the knee; up to 50 percent of people with cerebral palsy stop walking by adulthood. Researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have been testing robotic leg exoskeletons that help kids with CP walk more easily. According to the researchers, six of the seven study participants showed improved knee extension and were able to walk with robotic assistance after just six trials.

The exoskeletons are more than just a brace; they actively support a walking posture in kids with cerebral palsy without taking control away from the children themselves. The team wants to do more long-term studies with to see if kids’ walking will improve over time by using the robotic assistive devices. They also want to see if using exoskeletons for gait training can improve natural walking, even without the exoskeleton. “We want to transfer the walking patterns we see with the exoskeleton to walking without the exoskeleton,” the NIH’s Thomas Bulea told StatNews. “If we can correct or treat this crouch gait at a young age, then throughout their life, we may be able to increase their mobility.”

Exoskeletons aren’t new, of course. Lowe’s has been testing prototypes to help workers lift heavy objects, Harvard has a soft unit that could help soldiers with heavy packs, Lockheed Martin has tested exoskeletons for the US Navy and Hyundai is looking for ways to make them less expensive. This is the first study to bring the concept to children with cerebral policy, however, and could end up helping tons of kids for their entire lives.

Via: StatNews

Source: Science Translational Medicine

Apple Pulling Iranian Apps From App Store Due to U.S. Sanctions

Apple is “aggressively” cracking down on apps created by Iranian developers for users in Iran in an effort to comply with U.S. sanctions, reports The New York Times.

Apple does not offer its products in Iran, nor is there an Iranian App Store, but there are still millions of iPhones in the country that have been smuggled in from places like Dubai and Hong Kong. Iranian developers have created thousands of apps for these users, offering them in other App Stores outside of Iran.

The New York Times said Apple on Thursday removed Snapp, a popular app for an Uber-like ride hailing service that is popular in Iran. Many apps for food delivery, shopping, and other services have also been pulled over the course of the last few weeks.

Iranian developers who have been affected by the ban are being given the following message:

“Under the U.S. sanctions regulations, the App Store cannot host, distribute or do business with apps or developers connected to certain U.S. embargoed countries.”

An Apple spokesperson confirmed the authenticity of the message Iranian app developers are receiving, but declined to comment further on the matter.

In January, Apple started removing iOS apps originating in Iran from the App Store, and in February, told Iranian developers to remove any payment options from their apps in order to stop Iranian money from entering the United States. The more expansive removal of Iranian apps follows these initial efforts and comes on the heels of a new sanctions bill President Trump signed into law earlier this month.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Tag: App Store
Discuss this article in our forums

Apple might announce a 4K TV box at next month’s iPhone event

Apple is unveiling another new product with its latest iPhones and Apple Watches in September, according to Bloomberg. Cupertino is reportedly announcing its 4K- and HDR-capable Apple TV, as well. If you’ll recall, the publication reported earlier this year that the tech titan has updated its TV streaming box with the capability to stream in 4K resolution and to play more color-rich HDR videos. Since the upgraded box is expected to stream bigger files with a higher resolution, it will come with a faster processor. Obviously, you’ll need to pair it with a TV that’s also capable of playing 4K HDR content to bring out its full potential.

Despite the new capabilities and faster processor, Apple’s engineers were apparently unhappy with the incremental upgrade. They originally set out to build a cord-cutting device with the first Apple TV, but the company failed to forge partnerships to make that vision a reality. It’s unclear if the tech giant is still pursuing deals with broadcast networks, but Bloomberg says it’s talking to streaming services like Netflix about providing more 4K videos.

Apple is reportedly talking to film studios about selling 4K movies through iTunes, as well, and an iTunes UK transaction back in July marking a film as “4K, HDR” suggests negotiations are going smoothly. We’ll probably also see some original 4K shows in the future, considering the tech giant has already set aside $1 billion for original programming. In addition, both the old and upcoming TV boxes will be able to access Amazon Prime Video later this year.

According to the Bloomberg piece, Apple is seeking to “revive its video ambitions” with the upgraded device, as the original one hasn’t been doing as well as Roku, Chromecast and the Fire TV. It even made a few hires for that particular purpose over the past few months, including Timothy Twerdhal, the former Fire TV chief who’s now in charge of the Apple TV division. Unfortunately, we still don’t know how much the new streaming box will set you back, but it’s almost September anyway — you won’t have to wait too long to find out.

Source: Bloomberg

Tesla’s electric big rigs may focus on shorter routes

Tesla’s been teasing its all-electric big rigs since April, but details have been scarce ahead of its planned grand unveiling in September. Heck, Reuters had to peer into DMV emails to discover that the company intends to link its trucks together in self-driving “platoons” for efficiency. The news outlet has once again unearthed new info on the cargo hauling vehicles: They’ll reportedly have a range between 200 and 300 miles on a single charge.

Scott Perry, an executive at Miami-based fleet management company Ryder System, Inc, shared the info with Reuters after claiming to have met with Tesla earlier in the year. If true, that would put the automaker’s semis at around the same per-charge range as Tesla’s commercial vehicles — and far below the 1,000 miles diesel trucks can drive from a full tank of fuel.

Perry claimed that Tesla’s described its electric semi model as a “day cab” with no sleeper berth, which fits the range. That would qualify them for some of the shortest trips truckers make — say, from the train yard or airport to a nearby warehouse, or from there to a store or factory. But there are more of those than you might think: The chief strategy officer of Toronto-based Fleet Complete told Reuters that those make up about 30 percent of US trucking jobs.

Via: The Verge

Source: Reuters

Molecular data storage could hold every movie ever made on a Rubik’s Cube

Why it matters to you

A class of molecules known as single-molecule magnets will make future mass data storage more feasible.

Imagine being able to store upward of 200 terabits of data — the equivalent of every Hollywood movie ever — on a device measuring just one-inch square. That is not out of the realms of possibility, based on a new piece of research coming out of the University of Manchester. Scientists there recently demonstrated the ability to control the magnetism of a specific class of molecule to get them to store massive amounts of information. The bad news? To do so you need to keep your data chilled to minus-213 degrees Celsius — or 60 Kelvin.

“We have made a new molecule that holds magnetic information up to 60 K,” Dr. David Mills, a lecturer in the University of Manchester’s School of Chemistry, told Digital Trends. “This eclipses the previous record of 14 K set in 2011 and is now tantalizingly close to the temperature of liquid nitrogen, 77 K. Achieving magnetic information storage in single molecules at this temperature would make molecular data storage technologies economically viable, as liquid nitrogen is cheap and plentiful. We have studied this molecule in detail to understand why it is so much better at holding information than other molecules.”

There is a clear advantage in getting molecules to be able to store bits of binary information since this would make data storage devices much denser than they are at present. That is ideal for a world in which data is generated on an ever-increasing scale. It means that the Earth of, say, 2050 will not have to have as many Google data centers as it currently does McDonald’s.

Don’t get too excited yet, however, as a lot more engineering work needs to be carried out to turn this into a practical technology. It is unlikely that this particular molecule will ever be commercialized but the team is working to make even better magnetic molecules which could be used to carry out this task.

“Understanding in detail why this new molecule has such extraordinary magnetic properties is our current goal, as this will allow us to target new molecules with better performance,” Dr. Nick Chilton, also with the School of Chemistry, told us. “We think this has to do with molecular vibrations and are now trying to understand how these can be controlled.”

For now, you are better off sticking with these storage options. But you can still prepare for the storage world of the future by checking out the researchers’ paper, which was published in Nature.

Molecular data storage could hold every movie ever made on a Rubik’s Cube

Why it matters to you

A class of molecules known as single-molecule magnets will make future mass data storage more feasible.

Imagine being able to store upward of 200 terabits of data — the equivalent of every Hollywood movie ever — on a device measuring just one-inch square. That is not out of the realms of possibility, based on a new piece of research coming out of the University of Manchester. Scientists there recently demonstrated the ability to control the magnetism of a specific class of molecule to get them to store massive amounts of information. The bad news? To do so you need to keep your data chilled to minus-213 degrees Celsius — or 60 Kelvin.

“We have made a new molecule that holds magnetic information up to 60 K,” Dr. David Mills, a lecturer in the University of Manchester’s School of Chemistry, told Digital Trends. “This eclipses the previous record of 14 K set in 2011 and is now tantalizingly close to the temperature of liquid nitrogen, 77 K. Achieving magnetic information storage in single molecules at this temperature would make molecular data storage technologies economically viable, as liquid nitrogen is cheap and plentiful. We have studied this molecule in detail to understand why it is so much better at holding information than other molecules.”

There is a clear advantage in getting molecules to be able to store bits of binary information since this would make data storage devices much denser than they are at present. That is ideal for a world in which data is generated on an ever-increasing scale. It means that the Earth of, say, 2050 will not have to have as many Google data centers as it currently does McDonald’s.

Don’t get too excited yet, however, as a lot more engineering work needs to be carried out to turn this into a practical technology. It is unlikely that this particular molecule will ever be commercialized but the team is working to make even better magnetic molecules which could be used to carry out this task.

“Understanding in detail why this new molecule has such extraordinary magnetic properties is our current goal, as this will allow us to target new molecules with better performance,” Dr. Nick Chilton, also with the School of Chemistry, told us. “We think this has to do with molecular vibrations and are now trying to understand how these can be controlled.”

For now, you are better off sticking with these storage options. But you can still prepare for the storage world of the future by checking out the researchers’ paper, which was published in Nature.