Delta Air Lines rolls out free in-flight messaging for mobile users

Why it matters to you

If you fly Delta, you’ll be able to text loved ones on the ground for free starting October 1.

Delta Air Lines wants to make it easier for passengers to keep in touch with loved ones at 30,000 feet. Starting October 1, the world’s second-largest airline carrier will begin extending complimentary messaging to passengers on international and domestic flights.

Free mobile messaging will roll out to all Delta aircraft with Gogo Inflight Internet, which covers all but 130 airplanes in the airline’s 1,300-strong fleet. Once enabled via Delta’s in-flight portal page, compatible apps like iMessage, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger will come online automatically without the need for additional configuration.

But don’t get your hopes up for in-flight selfies. Delta’s free messaging doesn’t support videos, photos, or audio messages, meaning you’ll have to wait until you hit the tarmac to send anything more than a text.

“We know many of Delta’s customers want or need to stay connected in the air and on the ground, which is why we’re investing in an easy, free way to send and receive messages in-flight through some of the most popular global platforms,” Tim Mapes, Delta’s senior vice president and chief marketing officer, said in a press release. “Coupled with our investments in seatback screens, free entertainment, and high-speed Wi-Fi, free messaging is one more way customers can choose how to make the most of their time on Delta flights.”

Delta says it’s the first global carrier based in the U.S. to offer a complimentary messaging plan, but many of its competitors already extend free in-flight data to customers. Earlier this year, JetBlue waived Wi-Fi fees on all domestic and international flights, and international passengers on Emirates get up to 20MB of data for two hours. Separately, T-Mobile bundles free texting on Gogo-enabled Delta, United, American, and Virgin flights with most of its mobile plans.

But it’s a welcome improvement over the $2 fee Delta used to charge for in-flight messaging.

If you do shell out for Wi-Fi on your next Delta flight, you’ll get to take advantage of the airline’s upgrades. Delta says that over the next two years, it’ll install Gogo’s 2Ku Wi-Fi technology, a next-generation in-flight wireless system that supports streaming video and work-related VPN networks, in more than 600 aircraft for domestic and international flights. To date, it’s rolled out the system to 200.

HP ZBook 14u G4 review

Research Center:
HP ZBook 14u G4

Mobile workstations are curious machines. They’re not as attractive as the typical consumer or business-class laptop. They’re not usually as thin or as light, either, but there are exceptions. Our HP ZBook 14u G4 review looks at once such rarity.

Our review unit came equipped with a seventh-generation Intel Core i7-7600U CPU, 16GB of DDR4-2133 RAM, a 512GB PCIe solid-state drive (SSD), and an AMD FirePro W4190M GPU, all for the workstation-like price of $2,890 (currently on sale for $2,140). The machine can be equipped with up to 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD for the most power-hungry users, or you can cut some cost by dropping down to a Core i5 processor. A 4K screen is also available, though ours came with a 1080p display.

The HP ZBook 14u puts the “mobile” into mobile workstation, but did HP make too many compromises to fit workstation power into a smaller chassis? Read on to find out.

Uninspired but rugged design is more comforting than exciting

Like all of HP’s mobile workstations, the ZBook 14u is engineered to meet and pass 14 tests dictated by the MIL-STD-810g standard. While testing and rugged design doesn’t promise indestructability, it does mean that the machine is likely to take the abuse a typical office can dish out. If you need a machine that’s robust, and will last in challenging environments, then HP has engineered the ZBook 14u to comply.

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

The ZBook 14u won’t be winning any awards for its good looks, however. It’s a black hole of a clamshell notebook, and could sit on a table in the middle of an office and never catch a single glance. That’s not to say it looks bad – rather, it simply has zero personality.

Impressions improve when you take the ZBook 14u in your hands. The lid features a rubberized surface around its edge, which makes the notebook pleasant to carry around.

The ZBook 14u is engineered to meet and pass 14 tests dictated by the MIL-STD-810g standard.

It also feels solid, despite its reliance on plastic. Handling it doesn’t cause any creaks or groans, and the hinge opens and closes with one hand, which generates confidence in its longevity.

The ZBook 14u is thin at 0.87 inches, and weighs 3.61 pounds. Though it’s not the lightest notebook, it’s reasonably svelte for a 14-inch laptop, and weighs less than the Razer Blade or Apple MacBook Pro 15.  Most workstation laptops tip the scales at five or six pounds.

Connectivity is more than adequate

HP’s ZBook 14u has a VGA port, USB 3.0 Type-A port, and smartcard reader on the left side. On the right, you’ll find a USB 3.1 Type-C port, DisplayPort 1.2, another USB 3.0 Type-A port, gigabit Ethernet port, slide docking connection, and SIM module slot. Finally, an SD card reader is hidden underneath the right flank, and power is provided by a proprietary connector.

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

Wireless connectivity depends on the configuration, and whether optional vPro support is selected. All configuations include Intel dual-band Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.2. NFC and WWAN connectivity are optional.

A good, but not great, keyboard

The ZBook 14u sports a full-size keyboard with a mostly standard layout, including properly sized shift and enter keys, and usable arrow keys. HP put the home, page up, page down, and end keys along the right side, which is fine once you get used to it.

The ZBook 14u doesn’t have the fastest CPU and GPU, but its storage certainly won’t slow you down.

The only unusual keys are the Wi-Fi and mute toggles, found above the keyboard on the right. It’s odd to see them on their own, but they made Wi-Fi and mute status easy to gauge at a glance.

How does the keyboard feel? Okay. Key travel and tactile feedback were good, but the keys were just a bit stiff, and the bottoming action was a touch abrupt. It’s not enough to make typing uncomfortable, but we weren’t impressed with the overall feel. The keyboard backlight has only two brightness levels, which is less than most competitors.

The touchpad is a little smaller than usual, due to the dual set of buttons on the top and the bottom. Those buttons are responsive and quiet, and there are two pairs to accommodate the ThinkPad-like nubbin nestled between the G, H, and B keys. The touchpad is a Microsoft Precision model, with a surface that’s just slick enough without being imprecise and that provides reliable multitouch gesture support.

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

Windows Hello password-less login is provided by an old-school fingerprint scanner that’s swipe-based rather than relying on pure touch. It’s more difficult to use than other, more modern sensors, though it does work after a few swipes.

The uninspiring display is a bit of a disappointment

The HP ZBook 14u G4 has many display options, including touch, non-touch, Full HD (1,920 x 1,080), and 4K UHD (3,840 x 2,160) resolutions. Our review unit was equipped with a non-touch Full HD display.

When we put our colorimeter to work, we found the ZBook 14u’s display to be average across a broad range of criteria. Brightness was only moderate at 277 nits, while we like to see even matte displays come in at more than 300 nits. Color gamut was again average at 71 percent of AdobeRGB, and 93 percent of sRGB. Gamma was a bit dark at 2.4, where 2.2 is perfect.

Average color error was very good at 1.12 (1.0 or less is indistinguishable to the human eye), and contrast was just okay at 730:1 at full brightness. Overall, these are good scores that are just a bit lower across the board than some other mobile workstations that we’ve reviewed such as the Dell Precision 5520. Note that the HP ZBook Studio G4’s DreamColor display had much better color support, and would be a better choice for anyone professionally working with images and video.

In day-to-day use, we found the display just bright enough to be comfortable in a typical office setting. Image quality, though, had it flaws. Videos were a little darker than we’d like, while colors were true to life and not over-saturated. If you’re primarily doing productivity work, then the display will likely be perfectly acceptable. For professionals who need superior color support and accuracy, however the display falls short.

Surprisingly decent sound quality

The HP ZBook 14u has two speakers located underneath the keyboard deck, directly beneath the display. Volume is strong enough to fill a small office, and the speakers can become quite loud before distortion sets in. Audio is strong enough to share the occasional music video, with a surprising amount of bass, and a clear midrange. You won’t want to give up your headphones, but you also won’t find yourself reaching for them when watching a quick clip on YouTube.

At the low-end of the mobile workstation performance scale

The HP ZBook 14u is equipped with seventh-generation Intel dual-core processors — in the case of our review unit, a Core i7-7600U. It’s a fast chip, but it pales when compared to larger mobile workstations running quad-core CPUs, particularly those with high-end workstation-class processors.

Unsurprisingly, the ZBook 14u benchmarked right in line with our expectations. In Geekbench 4’s single-core and multi-core tests, the ZBook 14u scored 4,816 and 9,452, respectively.

That’s the same as similarly equipped machines, and in fact its single-core score is higher than most machines in our comparison group. Only the much more powerful Xeon E3-1535 v6 CPU in the ZBook Studio G4 was faster. In the multi-core test, however, the quad-core processors were all significantly faster than the ZBook 14u.

The ZBook 14u’s display falls short for professionals who need superior color support and accuracy.

In our real-world Handbrake test, which encodes a 420GB video file to H.265, the ZBook 14u took a fast-for-its-class 946 seconds to finish its encoding run. Compared to the HP EliteBook x360 1030 G2, which finished in 1,019 seconds with the same Core i7-7600U processor, that’s a great score. Yet when compared to the 465 seconds the ZBook Studio G4 needed to churn through the video, the ZBook 14u is no speed demon.

Ultimately, processor performance followed the same pattern we’ve seen throughout this review. The HP ZBook 14u is meant to be easy to carry around compared to larger and heavier mobile workstations, but it’s a machine you’ll want to reserve for lesser workloads.

Incredibly fast storage speeds are a welcome departure

HP has equipped the ZBook 14u with one of the fastest PCIe SSDs around, the Samsung SM961. It’s a real scorcher, which usually promises excellent performance.

It’s no surprise the ZBook 14u scored extremely well in the CrystalDiskMark test. With a read score of 2,950 megabits per second (Mb/s), and a write score of 1,650 Mb/s, you won’t find many notebooks with faster storage. The SSD in the ZBook Studio G4, for example, scored 1,349 Mb/s and 1,285 Mb/s, and the Dell Precision 5520 mobile workstation equipped with the same fast Samsung SSD scored an equivalent 2,931 Mb/s and 1,679 Mb/s.

While at some point fast SSDs are indistinguishable from one another in typical use, there’s no arguing with sheer speed when it comes to working with large files. The ZBook 14u might not be the fastest mobile workstation around when it comes to processor and graphics performance, but its storage won’t slow you down.

Rock-solid for professional applications, but it’s really not for gaming

The HP ZBook 14u is equipped with an AMD FirePro W4190M GPU with 2GB of GDDR5 RAM. That GPU is a member of AMD’s professional line, which is certified to provide rock-solid reliability in professional applications. As we mentioned earlier in this review, the ZBook 14u is focused on providing a highly mobile workstation experience, rather than the quickest.

In 3DMark, the GPU scores closer to high-end integrated graphics like Intel’s Iris Plus than it does to low-end discrete graphics like the Nvidia GeForce MX150. In the 3DMark Fire Strike test, for example, the FirePro W4910M scored 1,703, which is close to the 1,578 scored by the Iris Plus Graphics 640 GPU in the Microsoft Surface Pro. Nvidia’s MX150 scored 3,165, almost twice as fast, and the Nvidia Quadro M1200 professional GPU in the HP ZBook Studio G4 scored 3,911.

That means while the ZBook 14u is going to provide a reliable experience in professional applications, it’s not going to be a top performer.

HP ZBook 14u G4 Compared To

Acer Swift 3 SF314-52-557Y

Microsoft Surface Laptop

Dell XPS 13 (Kaby Lake)

Asus ZenBook UX305

Samsung ATIV Book 9 12.2-inch

Toshiba Kirabook (2014)

Asus Zenbook UX301LA

HP Envy x2

Dell XPS 12

Sony Vaio S Premium 13.3-inch

Asus U36Jc

Lenovo IdeaPad U110

Sharp M4000

Toshiba Dynabook SX

Sony PCG-X505/SP

For kicks, we ran Civilization VI’s built-in benchmark on medium and ultra detail settings. The ZBook 14u scored 18 frames per second (FPS) and 8 FPS, respectively. Simply put, you’ll want to stick to casual games to relax, and leave the hardcore gaming to another notebook.

Portability

At 0.87 inches thick and 3.61 pounds, the ZBook 14u isn’t thin and light by normal notebook standards, but makes for an easy mobile workstation to stick into a backpack and carry. Its rugged design means that you can take it just about anywhere you’re likely to go, and feel confident it’s going to take your abuse, and keep on working. The question is, just how long will its 51 watt-hour battery keep you working?

According to our testing, the answer is likely long enough, depending on the task. If you push the machine — as does our Basemark test, which runs the machine through a series of web pages that push the CPU and GPU — then you’ll see around two and three-quarter hours of battery life. That’s competitive with the larger and more powerful HP ZBook Studio G4, but less than the Dell Precision 5520, and significantly less than the HP EliteBook x360 G2.

On the other hand, if you’re watching video or surfing the web, then you’ll be working for considerably longer. In our test that repeats a locally-stored “Avengers” trailer until the battery gives out, the ZBook 14u lasted for a solid ten hours and 48 minutes. The HP ZBook 14u also managed to run our web browsing test, which loops through a series of popular web pages, for almost seven and a half hours. Those results are more competitive with other mobile workstations.

Mark Coppock/Digital Trends

HP has implemented its Fast Charge technology in the ZBook 14u G4, meaning you can charge from zero to 50 percent battery capacity in 30 minutes (but for safety reasons, not zero to 100 percent in an hour). That helps make the machine a more viable mobile workstation, if you can periodically juice up.

Software

HP loaded our review unit with its usual commercial software, such as its Client Security suite and Touchpoint Manager application. That goes along with the usual HP support utilities. Examples of advanced capabilities include HP’s SureStart Gen3, which provides BIOS-level protection against intrusion with an offline BIOS chip that can’t be accessed externally, and checks the machine at boot and during runtime for any unauthorized changes.

All of that makes sense for anyone working in a commercial environment but is overkill for most other users. None of it is particularly obtrusive, however, meaning that it’s there if you need it but won’t get in your way otherwise.

Warranty information

The HP ZBook 14u G4 is covered by a generous three-year parts and labor warranty. That’s par for the course with mobile workstations and much better than you’ll get with your typical consumer notebook.

Our Take

HP has made a machine that’s a perfect fit for a distinct class of users — those who need something that’s thin and light, but also want workstation-grade reliability and durability. For those people, the ZBook 14u G4 is an excellent choice.

Is there a better alternative?

The ZBook 14u G4 stands out as being the most mobile option in the mobile workstation market. To our knowledge, there isn’t another machine with a 14-inch display and in such a thin and light chassis. The ZBook 14u G4 stands out if your main concern is portability.

If you’re willing to carry around a heftier machine, however, there are better alternatives. HP’s own ZBook Studio G4 is one example. It offers significantly higher performance for professional applications, though you’ll need to spend around $3,500 to pick it up.

The Dell Precision 5520 is another great machine that’s larger and more powerful. The same theme applies here. It’s a better option if size and weight aren’t a major concern.

How long will it last?

The HP ZBook 14u G4 has a modern CPU and a professional GPU that’s sure to see solid long-term support. It’s also well-stocked with connectivity options, including a forward-looking USB Type-C port that means you can connect to tomorrow’s peripherals. Finally, the build quality is superior — the machine is built to last.

Should you buy it?

Only if you need the absolute most mobile workstation that still sports a GPU providing certified performance and reliability in professional applications. That’s a huge caveat, however. If you need a more powerful workstation, or an even thinner and lighter general productivity machine, then you’ll want to consider other options first.

Best accessories for Samsung Gear VR

What are the best accessories for Gear VR?

The Samsung Gear VR is a fantastic entry point for anyone interested in virtual reality. There are a ton of great experiences awaiting discovery, and it’s one of the most affordable headsets out there. To help make your time with Gear VR even more memorable, let’s take a look at some of the best accessories available now.

Read more at VRHeads

This is our first look at the ZTE Axon M foldable smartphone

ZTE will be releasing a dual-display phone in the coming months.

Since the launch of the first iPhone, smartphones have looked mostly the same. Sure, we have smaller bezels and modular attachments, but phones themselves still use the same touchscreen slate form factor. It looks like ZTE will be trying to mix that up soon.

Android Authority shared images of the upcoming phone, which will use a foldable form factor not seen since the days of the Kyocera Echo. The ZTE Axon M — previously known as the ZTE Axon Multy — will allegedly feature two 1080p displays, which will fold out to a total screen size of 6.8-inches.

As for internals, an earlier leak suggests the phone will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor, 4GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage (no word about expandability) and a 3120 mAh battery. For one screen, that size battery sounds about average, but it may prove a bit too small for two. The Kyocera Echo had a similar problem, to the point that Sprint shipped that phone with a second battery.

Rather than have a separate rear and front camera, the device will feature a single 20-megapixel camera that pivots to face either direction. The phone will use Android’s multitasking feature to let the user look at two applications at a time, one application on each screen. There are no hints toward which version of Android the phone will launch with, but if I were a betting man (and I am) I’d bet on Android 7.1 Nougat with ZTE’s minimal touches on top. The device will allegedly be an AT&T exclusive priced at $650 and tie heavily into the carrier’s DirecTV service (read: bloatware).

ZTE plans to hold a launch event on October 17 in New York to announce the phone. Are you interested in a foldable smartphone? Let us know down below!

Uber will stop leasing cars to drivers in the US

Those rumors of Uber shuttering US car leasing for drivers were true. A spokesman has confirmed to the Wall Street Journal that it’s closing Xchange Leasing in favor of a “less capital-intensive approach.” To put it another way, the initiative cost far too much money — the earlier leak had it losing about $9,000 per car versus the $500 it expected. The company hasn’t said what it will do to replace the American program, although this isn’t likely the end of leasing worldwide. Its program in southeast Asia is likely to continue despite problems with defective vehicles.

The leasing program started in 2015 as a bid to attract drivers that couldn’t buy cars given their poor or non-existent credit ratings. As the WSJ explains, though, the program had a knock-on financial effect. As these were high-risk drivers, they had to pay high leasing fees — and that meant working long hours that wore down the cars and hurt their value. Also, Uber’s reliance on existing dealers led to salespeople upselling drivers on cars that affected their earnings.

There wasn’t much choice in the matter when Uber can’t afford to lose money indefinitely. However, it does mean that Uber will have to shift its attention more toward other incentives, such as allowing tips. Ultimately, its main concern is having enough drivers on the road — that can include giving existing drivers a reason to stay. Unfortunately, that also makes it considerably harder to drive for Uber if you don’t already own a car.

Source: Wall Street Journal

Wandercraft’s exoskeleton was made to help paraplegics walk

There’s a reason you’ve never seen fully autonomous exoskeletons that help the disabled walk without crutches: Building one is crazy hard. But the founders of a Paris-based startup called Wandercraft are uniquely qualified to do it. They’re roboticists who happen to have loved ones in wheelchairs, giving them both the expertise and motivation to develop an exoskeleton that helps users walk again. After years of development, they’re nearly ready to show it to the public, following a round of promising patient trials.

Wandercraft ran successful preliminary trials with a handful of clients using “Atalante,” its latest prototype. “There was such a strong emotional response from our test subjects,” said Managing Director Matthieu Masselin. “For a lot of them, it was the first time they had been able to walk since their accidents.”

A lot of companies have tried to develop exoskeletons for paraplegics, but models from Ekso Bionics, ReWalk and others require crutches, which heavily stress patients’ shoulder muscles. That limits training and rehab sessions, as patients often need days to recover from muscle fatigue.

Paraplegics want a device that lets them be vertical and walk a bit, preferably as often as possible. That would help them deal with a host of medical problems that able-bodied folks don’t experience, like cardiovascular issues, pressure sores, incontinence, loss of muscle tone and depression, to name a few.

Being able to stand and walk without the discomfort of crutches would not only provide a huge psychological boost but also help reduce or eliminate many of those symptoms. “Our friends in wheelchairs told us, ‘OK, if there was a device that would enable us to be able to walk again, there is no price that I wouldn’t pay,’” said Masselin.

Without crutches, assistive exoskeletons (or “exos,” as the team prefers to call them) are orders of magnitude more complex. Wandercraft’s latest device, the fourth-generation model, weighs nearly 130 pounds (60kg) and must have perfect, humanlike balance so it won’t fall over and injure the patient. “We discovered that stability and the human gait are some of the hardest problems we’ve ever encountered in robotics,” Masselin said.

Unlike most current exos, which are more like motorized braces, the Wandercraft is a rigid, robotic structure. It has multiple powerful, compact electric motors at the hips, knees and ankle joints. A large battery is fitted at the back, along with an Intel Core i7-equipped microcomputer that does the complex math needed to ensure the machine can balance and walk.

Building a robot is hard enough, but attaching a human to it multiplies the degree of difficulty. “If the exo bends the knee, it has to stop before the knee of the person breaks, obviously,” Masselin noted.

To make such a complex device work, the company recruits top roboticists, mechanical engineers and coders — all fields in high demand. It must also enlist folks from biomedical, medical, biomechanical and other diverse areas and train them to work with the development team. To top it off, the exoskeleton and the code have to conform to medical protocols, and Wandercraft must run an elaborate regulatory gauntlet before patients can ever use it.

After five years of dealing with those nearly overwhelming challenges, the company finally tested its Atalante exo with patients. They’re not ready to show video to the public yet — for reasons I’ll explain shortly — but I was able to see it in action during a private showing.

Patients are first attached to the device by straps that are specially designed to distribute pressure evenly, at the waist, hips, knees and ankles. Those can fully support users’ weight while their feet are placed on metal walking pads with rubber grips.

You start by sitting in the device and then make a gesture to stand up by bending at the waist. That activates motors that automatically drive the exoskeleton to a standing position. Walking can then be cued either by patient gestures or automatic programs started by the therapist.

The gait movement is obviously slow, but patients can take multiple steps without any crutches or external assistance. They assume a slightly bent posture, but it looks far more comfortable than the demonstration I saw of Ekso Bionics’ system back in 2013. I’d describe the motion as controlled lurching, but keep in mind that such tech has never been tried and many of the test subjects hadn’t risen from their wheelchairs in years. With time, patients would develop more skill, and the exoskeleton is bound to get smoother.

Despite the limitations, Wandercraft, and particularly the patients, saw the trials as a success. “It was huge for the team, because we’d been working so hard on this device for many years,” Masselin said. “But for those people, real users, it was even stronger, emotionally speaking, because they could really see the potential of the device. And a lot of them told us they were sad to have to stop the test.”

Despite their obvious enthusiasm, Wandercraft is quick to tamp down expectations. “Showing people too early what you’re doing and giving them grand visions that you are not going to be able to deliver after that, we think is very, very negative,” said Masselin. “We don’t want to stress people by giving them false hope.” For those reasons, it plans to show doctors and physical therapists video of the device in action before the public sees it.

The company just received a much-needed €15 million ($17.6 million) funding boost and has a careful plan to deliver its exoskeleton to market. The design and development is now finished, so Wandercraft is entering the specification phase to define exactly how patients and medical personnel can use it. By the end of the year, Wandercraft will unveil its exoskeleton via a demonstration video to the public.

The next step after that is the so-called CE Marking, or European equivalent of FDA certification. It hopes to receive that sometime in 2018. Afterwards, it can sell the suit in Europe for use in medical facilities under the strict supervision of trained specialists. The company expects to put its first exeoskeletons in medical facilities by the end of 2018. It will eventually chase FDA approval so it can market the device in the US.

Wandercraft Managing Director Matthieu Masselin with “Atalante”

Wandercraft has bigger dreams though. Next, it wants to build a lighter, fully autonomous version of its suit for personal use by paraplegics. Once users strapped it on, they could go out of their homes and walk in a park or other uncrowded location. That requires even more advanced tech, as the suit would need to be able to handle obstacles like stairs. As it stands right now, even a pebble can throw off such devices.

The company has taken on a risky and possibly not financially rewarding type of product. And yet it has recruited some insanely talented young people, including Physics Olympiad-caliber employees. So why would these folks do it, when there are more potentially lucrative opportunities in AI, self-driving and other areas?

The answer might lie on the company’s LinkedIn page, of all places. When you see the callow money-centric culture of some major companies, Wandercraft’s recruiting call is life-affirming. “You will have stunning colleagues, chosen because they are selfless team players and not lone geniuses,” it reads. “We make advanced technology exo[skeletons]s that help mobility impaired persons and impact their health and happiness — not pizza delivery apps.”

Amazon’s new Echo designs bring Alexa in all sizes

Aside from the Echo Spot, Amazon also introduced two new versions of its speaker-only Echos. One is simply known as the Echo, while the more advanced version is called the Echo Plus. Both boast audio improvements with a new speaker architecture, a dedicated tweeter, a 2.5-inch down-firing woofer and Dolby sound. The two also boast better far field technology, which means you should now be able to shout “Alexa” at your Echo from across a crowded room and it’ll still recognize you.

The differences between the two come down to design, and the fact that the Plus comes with the additional bonus of smart home integration. The new Echo is smaller than the original Echo, but larger than the Dot. At first glance, the new Echo’s size is more akin to the size of Google Home, which is arguably Amazon’s closest competitor in the smart speaker space.

What is particularly different design-wise is that it comes in an array of different cases. You can choose from different fabric options as well as a couple of different wood veneer choices. According to Amazon, you can buy a few and swap them out if you want, which is similar to what you can do with Google Home’s speaker base. In person, the wood veneer looks a little cheap, but I do like the feel of the fabric ones.

The Echo Plus, on the other hand, is just as tall as the original Echo, and has many of the same features as the smaller Echo. The main difference is that it comes with a smart home hub that promises to pair all of your various smart home devices with just a simple command: “Alexa, discover my devices.” Early bundles of the Echo Plus even comes with a Philips Hue lightbulb so you can see this for yourself. Usually, you would need to hook a Hue hub to your router for the lightbulb to be connected. But with the Plus, that Hue hub isn’t required. Right now, the Plus works with ZigBee products, but Amazon hopes to add more compatibility in the future. The Plus also promises enhanced 360-degree omnidirectional audio, with even better sound quality than the smaller Echo.

Though they weren’t connected to anything, I also took a quick look at the Echo Button, which is a sort of odd game show type buzzer that you can use with trivia games. Think of it as the miniature version of the buzzer on Press Your Luck. It glows in different colors, and you can distribute them to your friends to recreate your very own living room game show. Some games include Sounds Fun with Mike Epps, Buzzer Beater Basketball Trivia with Karl-Anthony Towns, Fourth Down Football Trivia with Philip Rivers, Full Count Baseball Trivia with Buster Posey from Ground Control, as well as Beat the Intro from Musicplode. According to Amazon, this is just the first of many different Alexa Gadgets, so stay tuned for more of these weird and wacky Echo accessories.

The new Echo is $100, the Echo Plus is $150, while the Echo Buttons will be $20 for a two-pack. The two new Echo speakers will be available next month, while the Buttons will be available this holiday season.

Amazon’s Echo Spot is a cuter version of the Echo Show

Arguably the cutest device announced at today’s Amazon event is the Echo Spot, an adorable miniaturized version of the Echo Show. I got a closer look at the Spot after the Amazon event today, and I have to say that I definitely wouldn’t mind having this as an alarm clock. It does all of the same things as the Show, except in a smaller, and more compact package.

While I thought the Show might be more at home in a kitchen with its large display, the Spot is definitely more suited for the bedside table. It’s sphere-like shape is a little bigger than a softball, and reminds me a lot of the Chumby, which also pitched itself as a smart alarm clock. You can use it to see the weather, watch video clips, check in to your baby monitor, or just use it to check the time — it comes with 12 different clock faces, some of which can change color depending on time of day.

I unfortunately was not able to really play with it, as the devices seen in the photos here are just demo units and not hooked up to anything. Still, I did swipe around on the touchscreen for a few minutes. The display looks nice and crisp, and it was pretty intuitive from the brief time I had with it. The viewing angles seemed pretty good too.

The Echo Spot boasts a new microphone array with a new far-field technology that promises better noise cancellation so you can shout at it even in a loud room. Just like Echo Show, there’s a front-facing camera so you can use it for video conferencing. There’s also a built-in speaker, Bluetooth and an audio line out.

The Spot is available for $150 in both black and white and will be available in December this year.

Scientists record a fourth set of gravitational waves

Last year, researchers confirmed the existence of gravitational waves with two Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) detectors. Shortly thereafter, they detected two additional gravitational wave-causing events that sent ripples through the universe. Well, we can now add a fourth to that list, as astronomers announced another set of waves. And for the first time, they observed the waves with a third detector — the Italy-based Virgo.

Let’s review a little before we dig into the huge benefits that come with having three detectors rather than two. First, gravitational waves are essentially ripples in spacetime. When some major event occurs in the universe — like, for example, when two black holes merge into one — a ripple is sent out in all directions and it travels through spacetime at the speed of light. Albert Einstein predicted these sorts of waves existed, but it wasn’t until the LIGO project that researchers could actually observe them.

The LIGO and Virgo detectors are all largely the same design. Two very long tunnels are arranged perpendicular to each other. At the point where they meet, a laser beam is split and part of it travels down one tunnel, and the other part down the second tunnel. Mirrors at the tunnel ends bounce the beams back and if no major cosmic activity has occurred, the two beams cancel each other out. However, if say two black holes slam into each other and create gravitational waves, those waves will stretch and pull spacetime, changing the length of the tunnels ever so slightly. When that happens, the two laser beams are bounced back at slightly different times and when they meet, the difference between them provides astronomers with all sorts of information about what happened, where and when.

The earlier detections of gravitational waves were done with the two LIGO detectors in Washington and Louisiana. Virgo joined them on August 1st and scored its first detection on August 14th. The gravitational waves that were detected were created by two black holes — 31 and 25 times the mass of our Sun — merging around 1.8 billion light-years away. The resulting black hole is approximately 53 times the mass of the Sun. What happened to those three leftover solar masses? They were converted into gravitational wave energy.

A third detector means scientists can get a much better idea about which direction the waves came from and it works similar to the way seismometers pinpoint the location of an earthquake. The two LIGO detectors themselves can provide a general direction of the event — a pretty large area equal to around 1/40th of the night sky. But adding Virgo into the mix reduces the window to a tenth of that area, which means once a signal is detected, astronomers can swing a telescope towards the region of origin and maybe catch a glimpse of it in action.

The Virgo team hints in their press release that more detections from the three units will be announced sometime soon and some are hoping to hear that they’ve snagged a measurement, and maybe even a visual, of another big celestial event — two neutron stars merging.

The recent detection was described in a paper published in Physical Review Letters.

Image: NASA

Via: BBC

Source: Physical Review Letters, Virgo, National Science Foundation

Amazon brings voice control to Hulu and other video apps on Fire TV

You can already use Alexa voice commands to steer some video playback on a Fire TV, but Amazon is about to throw the doors wide open. It just unveiled a slew of partners that will use the Video Skills Kit to add Alexa support to their video apps, and these are definitely companies you’ll recognize: Hulu, PlayStation Vue, CBS All Access, Bravo, Showtime and multiple NBC apps will all take spoken playback commands. You might not have to lift a finger to skip backwards in The Handmaid’s Tale or switch live channels in Vue.

Amazon will only say that support is “coming soon,” but Hulu has narrowed its timeframe down to sometime this fall.

It wasn’t hard to see this coming given the existence of Video Skills in the first place, but it’s still welcome news. Although Amazon is already welcoming of video services beyond its own, this gives them first-class treatment. You don’t have to subscribe to Prime Video or a handful of other services just to see Alexa flex its muscles.

Source: Hulu