Point this $6 Nubee infrared temperature gun at anything to see how hot or cold it is

Point it at anything and get the temperature! I wonder how warm my desk is…

Is this deal for me?

This Nubee temperature gun with infrared thermometer is down to $6.27 as an Amazon add-on item. The Nubee normally sells for around $20, and this is its lowest price ever.

An add-on item requires you to order $25 worth of stuff, although the $6.29 for the temperature gun does count as part of the total. If you aren’t over $25 with an add-on item in your cart, Amazon will only let you continue shopping instead of checking out. (Pro tip: Order using your Echo by saying “Alexa, order the Nubee temperature gun” and you may get the add-on price without the add-on limitations!)

You’d be surprised at the sheer number of practical uses you can find for a temperature gun. Heating up a pan and want to know if it’s hot enough yet? Use the gun! Boiling water? Looking for leaks around windows or vents? Get the surface temperature of food or check your roasting coffee beans. If that’s not enough for you, you can always use it to make sure your toilet water temperature is constant or to drive your cat crazy.

Features include:

• Max temperature function: it can take the highest temperature of the area tested by scanning and save the data at the bottom of the screen.
• EMS adjustable function: each article has its suitable emissivity, the adjustable emissivity function can make the test more accurate by adjust suitable emissivity for different articles.
• Reads in Celsius or Fahrenheit, there is a switch on the panel to choose between them.
• There’s also a switch to turn on or off the laser sight and adjust the emissivity on different objects.
• Aim precisely at whatever you measure thanks to the laser beam guiding the way. Even from a distance, the laser provides a mark to aim with, ensuring that you’re measuring what you want to be measuring.
• The Infrared lens inside that provides temperature readings without touching or coming close to anything dangerously hot or cold.
• Instantaneous results appear on the Infrared thermometer’s LED screen for fast readouts of temperature.

TL;DR

• What makes this deal worth considering? – Temperature guns are a great way to get a reading on things that might be too hot or too cold to touch, and this one is down to an all-time low price as long as you can make it work as an add-on.
• Things to know before you buy! – If you have an Amazon Echo device, you may be able to get around the $25 limitation for add-on items by saying “Alexa, order the Nubee temperature gun.” Sneaky, sneaky, Amazon. The trick is finding the right listing, which may be difficult but seems to work ok for this one.

See at Amazon

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DxO One camera with USB-C coming to Android later this year

Still no word on pricing or exact availability.

If you’ve been following flagship smartphones for any length of time this year, chances are you’ve heard something or another about how this phone has the highest DxOMark rating, and just a few months later, a new phone came out with the same praise.

We can all agree at this point that DxOMark ratings are pretty useless when it comes to judging smartphone cameras, but DxO as a company is actually releasing something quite interesting later this year. It’s called the DxO One, and it’s a camera that plugs into your Android phone via USB Type-C.

DxO One first launched with a lightning cable for the iPhone back in 2015, and it received positive reviews at the time. However, it’s steep price tag of $499 kept most potential customers at bay.

The one-inch sensor on the DxO One can capture up to 20.2 MP images, and the f/1.8 aperture should allow for solid low-light performance. There’s a fixed focal lens of 32mm, and it’s capable of capturing images in both JPEG and RAW. While you’ll want to plug the DxO One into your phone to get the full experience, you can also capture images blindly by using the gadget entirely on its own.

We weren’t sure if the DxO One would ever make its way to Android, so it’s nice to finally have some closure on the matter. DxO says that it’ll have more information about the Android-compatible version of the One on November 2, and the device will initially be released through some sort of Early Access program. Unfortunately, we don’t currently know if pricing will change or when it’ll be widely available for everyone to purchase.

From the Editor’s Desk: Why DxOMark scores are basically worthless

The $13 EasyAcc Mini portable Bluetooth speaker doesn’t have small sound

Good things come in small packages.

Is this deal for me?

The EasyAcc Mini portable Bluetooth speaker is down to $12.79 with code X2J7ATBC on Amazon. It has regularly sold at $16 for the last several months and has only dropped below $14 once before.

This code also works on the Red and Blue versions but only brings the total down to $13.59 since they regularly sell at $17.

It’s a safe bet you aren’t going to find a speaker that produces all this sound and yet costs less than $20.

Features include:

• Small, stylish, compact, and extremely portable; fits easily into your bag or pocket so you can use it on the go.
• Equipped with a 3.5mm audio cable for non-Bluetooth devices (just insert the Micro USB end into the speaker); compatible with all touch screen tablets,smartphones, laptops, iPads, iPhones, and iPods with Bluetooth built-in.
• Cylindrical microphonedesign can reduce background noise during voice calls (speakerphone must be within 20cm).
• Built-in rechargeable lithium battery offers 4-5 hours of playtime and is charged via Micro USB Cable(charging cable included).

This speaker supports microSD cards, so if you want to play a collection of your own digital music, you should invest in one.

TL;DR

• What makes this deal worth considering? – This is one of the lowest prices we’ve ever seen, and this speaker is a lot more powerful than it looks.
• Things to know before you buy! – This is an older model in the EasyAcc Mini lineup. The more recent Mini 2 is $25, though.

See at Amazon

ZTE Axon M hands-on: The clamshell is back

The ZTE Axon M is a specimen not seen in the world of the smartphone in some time: it’s a clamshell. No, not a flip-top communicator of the Starfleet variety, but a side-folding design previously reserved for fancy wallets, pocket maps, and “little black books.” Some, like MrMobile’s esteemed thumbnail designer, might go so far as to call the ZTE Axon M a “folding phone.” But MrMobile himself would never be so bold.

For real though: in a sea of single-sided slabs, ZTE’s Axon M is a legitimately interesting design. Featuring two 5.2″ displays bonded by a solid-feeling hinge and a thick aluminum midplate, the Axon M has the kind of heft that makes you take a smartphone seriously … and the double-wide screen real estate that’ll conjure memories of Best Buy’s big-TV section. But for all its interesting points, the Axon M isn’t what you’d call unique; it’s a design we’ve seen before, on a phone that sold about as poorly as a phone can sell. Will this time be different? Tune in for MrMobile’s first look, and stay tuned to the YouTube Channel for the Axon M review, coming soon!

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Google Advanced Protection is for high-profile hacking targets

Many internet giants offer security measures like two-factor authentication (which you should really use) to keep your account safe from hackers. But there are a handful of people who are so valuable as targets that hackers will go after them specifically — say, election campaign managers. And Google wants to do something about it. It’s introducing the previously rumored Advanced Protection Program, an extra layer of security for people who virtually expect cyberattacks. Sign up and you’ll put restrictions on your account that will be borderline onerous, but could be vital when you know you’re facing a serious threat.

To start, you need a physical security key to sign in. These certainly aren’t unheard of (Facebook supports them), but it’s not optional for anyone in Advanced Protection. Google also limits full access to your Gmail and Drive accounts to specific apps (currently its own), so a rogue program can’t spy on you or steal your data. And hackers won’t have much luck with social engineering, either. There are “additional reviews and requests” if someone claims to be locked out of an account, reducing the chances that someone can impersonate you well enough to get account details.

Google is promising to “continually update” its security measures to adapt to threats. You’ll get the latest the company can offer, in other words.

At the moment, Advanced Protection is limited to personal Google accounts. However, you don’t need to be a celebrity or political figure to enroll. Google is quick to stress that this is for anyone who has a particular reason to be worried about hacks, such as someone escaping an abusive relationship or a journalist who needs to protect the anonymity of a source. While it’s patently obvious that this is coming about as a response to the hacks that defined the 2016 US election (Google makes not-so-vague allusions to the attack on John Podesta’s account), it’s clearly useful on a much broader level.

Via: Reuters, Wired

Source: Google, Advanced Protection

Microsoft’s internal bug database was hacked in 2013

Over four years ago, Microsoft’s internal database for bug tracking was apparently breached by hackers. It was discovered in 2013 but never disclosed to the public, according to five former employees of the company who spoke with Reuters.

This is a serious issue because of what exactly was hacked. Microsoft’s internal database of bugs contains secret security flaws and possible exploits within its widely used software that need to be fixed. With this information, hackers and foreign governments had a road map on how to breach vulnerable systems.

Microsoft was able to fix the stolen vulnerabilities within a few months after the hack was detected. The company also checked to see whether the leaked information had been used in other breaches around that same time, before Microsoft was able to patch them. The company was unable to link their internal hack to any other breaches.

According to the former employees, Microsoft has since put more of an emphasis on internal security. Still, the fact that Microsoft didn’t disclose that the breach occurred isn’t a great move. It’s not hard to follow their line of thinking — that bringing publicity to it might encourage the group responsible to exploit these vulnerabilities more quickly because they knew the breach had been noticed and an eventual fix for these issues was coming. But the fact remains that computer systems around the world were even more vulnerable than usual because of a security breach. Had it been public, the organizations could have taken preventative measures to ensure their security.

Source: Reuters

DxO’s snap-on smartphone camera is coming to Android

DxO, the company best known for its lens and camera scores, is also behind one of the nicer smartphone-attached cameras out there, the $499 DxO One. Up until now, it has only supported the iPhone and iPad, but the company has revealed that it will soon release the DxO One Android via an early access program. It didn’t give many details, other than saying it will attach to type-C USB connectors, so it’ll likely only work with newer Android devices.

It should function much the same as it does on an iPhone, turning your smartphone into a display for the camera and letting you choose the f/stop, shutter speed, ISO and other settings. With a one-inch, 20-megapixel sensor similar to the one on the high-end Sony RX100 V compact, it’ll generally give you nicer images than even the iPhone 8 Plus, Galaxy Note 8, Pixel 2 and other top-shelf smartphone cameras.

The company says version 1.0 of the DxO One Android camera app will arrive “in the coming weeks” as part of the Early Access program. You can sign up now to get in line, and the company has promised more details on November 2nd.

In other DxO news, there are new accessories for its current iPhone DxO One, too. For better selfies, there’s a new tilt stand (above, right) that lets you set different angles for hands-free use, along with an external battery pack (left) that doubles its runtime. The latter also includes the “Outdoor Shell,” a weather-resistant case. The tilt stand is included with new DxO One cameras (the company didn’t mention if current owners can buy it separately) and the battery pack is $60.

Via the latest version 3.0 iOS update, the DxO One now supports Facebook Live streaming with multi-camera shoots, using both the DxO One and your phone’s own camera. That could be helpful for folks who do a lot of live streaming, as an extra camera angle can make your shows more interesting.

It bears mentioning that you could buy a used Sony RX100 Mark III or IV for around the same price, and then just pair it with your smartphone. The DxO one is smaller, though, and more convenient if you share a lot of photos or edit them on your phone. Also, camera makers are not known for their great smartphone apps, and Sony’s PlayMemories app is no exception. As mentioned, the DxO One is $499 at DxO’s store.

Source: DxO One

ZTE Axon M hands-on: A new hope for dual-screen phones

Many companies have tried to make the mythical dual-screen folding smartphone a reality. All of them have failed. But ZTE thinks it’s time to try again. Now that Android supports multi-window apps, the company expects it will get enough buy-in from developers to create a phone that people will actually find useful. The Axon M will be an AT&T exclusive when it arrives in the US next month for 30 monthly payments of $24.17. I tried out the Axon M and while I’m not completely won over by the handset itself, I find the potential applications compelling.

Think of the Axon M as a tiny laptop with a screen where the keyboard and trackpad would usually be, except the screens face outward. A hinge in the middle lets you flip one display all the way back so both panels are on the outside. The secondary screen is thinner than the main display, but it feels sturdy and didn’t flex during my testing. Together, the two 5.2-inch displays make one 6.75-inch screen and are separated by a 180-degree hinge.

The hinge is rigid enough to hold the screens in place even when they are slightly ajar, and this lets you prop the phone up in what’s called “tent mode” in most convertible laptops. Because the Axon M can only be opened up as wide as 180 degrees for full-screen viewing, you can’t get the displays to face each other. For the most part, you’ll likely be using the Axon M like a regular phone, with both screens pointing outward and just the primary display turned on.

To make use of these viewing positions, the Axon M features three modes that you toggle through by tapping the M button ZTE added to the Android 7.1 Nougat navigation bar. This brings up four icons: Extend (full screen), Dual (two apps side by side), Mirror (same contents on both screens) and the regular single-screen format. The names can be confusing to understand at first, but the icons help by graphically depicting what each mode does. For example, Mirror mode is represented by a rectangle split into two with the letter “A” on either side, while Dual shows “A” on one side and “B” on the other.

The Axon M switched quickly among these modes during my demo. Mirror and Extend are relatively straightforward, since you just have to tap the corresponding symbols and the display is either duplicated or stretched, respectively. Dual mode brings up a launcher for you to pick the app that you want to run on the second screen.

All three modes are useful in their own way. Dual, for instance, makes for efficient multitasking since you can drag and drop info between the screens, bring up a reference Wikipedia article while typing an email, or compose a tweet while watching a YouTube video. Developers don’t need to implement new code for this to work, either; as long as the app works with Android Nougat’s multi-window feature, it will work on the Axon M.

Mirror mode has obvious benefits as well. It lets you display PowerPoint presentations or show a YouTube video to someone sitting across from you. It was also fun to play a game of Battleship in this mode with ZTE’s global vice president of technology Jeff Yee, but the game had to be optimized to recognize input from alternating screens.

The advantages of Extend mode aren’t as obvious. It opens an app across two screens, which lets you see more content at once. My first thought was that the squarish aspect ratio of the two combined screens is highly uncommon and would make for an awkward experience when watching videos or looking at pictures. But ZTE had other plans in mind.

Instead of stretching media to fit, the Axon M uses the extra space to show things like the comments section on YouTube videos. When Twitter is in Extend mode (and the phone is held horizontally), the bottom display shows the keyboard, so it doesn’t cut into the space above for you to compose your thoughts. The Gallery app makes use of the extra space by showing thumbnails of all your pictures on one side while displaying a full-size preview on the other.

Apps work well in Extend mode when they’re designed for it. ZTE says it has already optimized 80 of the 100 most commonly used apps, including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Photos, Chrome, Maps, Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, SoundCloud, Firefox and Pandora. Apps that haven’t been optimized will go into tablet mode when Extend is activated to make use of the larger canvas. The difference, though, is that these apps won’t realize that there is a half-inch tall gap in the middle of the display, so when you’re, say, scrolling through an article, words will be lost in that dead space. Optimized apps, on the other hand, will skip over this gap so you won’t miss any crucial information as you browse.

It’s nice that ZTE is trying to alleviate this issue, but this fix doesn’t feel like a feasible long-term solution. The gap is jarring when I’m trying to view things continuously across the two screens. It’s less of a problem in Dual and Mirror modes, when boundaries for separate apps makes sense, or even in Extend when the gained space is used for something functionally distinct. Yee acknowledged this, and said the company’s goal is to ultimately remove the bezel in future iterations. He’s not sure if it’s feasible within a year, but he said that achieving it in two years is possible, given the technologies he is seeing emerge.

Meanwhile, the company has implemented a handful of features to make such a unique device feel easy to use. You can swipe on the navigation bar when you’re in an app to open it in Extend mode. Pinch to zoom works in full screen, too, even if one finger is on the top panel and another is on the bottom. If you have two videos open in Dual mode, only the audio from one will play, and a button will appear on the top right of the main display to let you toggle the source from which to play sound.

Speaking of, the Axon M is equipped with the same dual speakers and dedicated sound card as the Axon 7, which made for loud, crisp audio during my demo. I also found the Axon M’s screen quality decent — both screens use LCD panels with full HD resolution. Although they’re technically identical, I noticed some discoloration on the secondary display when I looked at it from a wide angle. Straight on, though, image quality appeared to be the same across the board.

Since it’s a dual-screen phone, the Axon M technically doesn’t have a front or back. Because of that, it doesn’t need to distinguish between rear and front cameras. ZTE uses just one 20-megapixel sensor above the Axon M’s main display, opting instead to enable the respective screen for the viewfinder. This can be confusing. When I first opened the camera app, it defaults to the rear even though the sensor was already facing me. So the first thing you’ll see is a message asking you to turn the phone around and use the screen on the other side to frame your picture.

When you tap the icon to use the “front” camera, an alert pops up to tell you to turn the phone around, and the other display is enabled. It’s an unwieldy setup that would almost be worth the hassle if the pictures turned out great, since this is technically one of the sharpest front cameras around. Unfortunately, the photos I took with my preview unit were muted and dull. Give me back a dedicated selfie camera, ZTE!

A big point of concern about a phone with two displays is battery life. The Axon M has a 3,180mAh cell, which the company says will last about a full day, depending on your usage habits. Yee said it’s not yet clear how best to estimate runtime, since the company has to test the phone in both single-screen and dual-screen conditions.

The Axon M’s Snapdragon 821 processor isn’t the newest chipset on the market, but performed admirably in the OnePlus 3T. During my preview, the Axon M ran smoothly, and its 4GB of RAM seemed enough to handle the device’s multitasking. Granted, I didn’t get to push the phone to extremes to see how well it holds up.

Ultimately, the Axon M still feels like a proof of concept. ZTE is aware it will face challenges with such a unique product, and says it remains dedicated to both the Axon M (dual-screen) and regular Axon (single-screen) lines. Yee said the company will launch a developer website to offer “tips and tricks” on how to optimize apps for the Axon M. For now, the Axon M feels like the first iPhone — not as sophisticated as today’s flagships, but it lays the groundwork for future generations.

Razer’s Blade Stealth laptop now packs a quad-core processor

Like the thought of Razer’s Blade Stealth ultraportable, but wish it had a bit more oomph for multitasking? You’re getting your wish. Razer has released a version of its 13-inch ultraportable with a quad-core 8th-generation Core i7 processor (namely, the 1.8GHz i7-8550U) inside rather than the usual 7th-gen dual-core chip. This doesn’t magically turn it into a gaming machine — you’ll still need a Core enclosure for that — but it could make all the difference when editing a video or juggling numerous apps. The CPU update also gives you an extra hour of estimated battery life (10 hours total), so you’re more likely to make it through a long day.

The quad configuration is available now in North America (France, Germany and the UK get it later in the year) for $1,699 and ships with the usual 16GB of RAM, a 3,200 x 1,800 screen as well as a 512GB SSD. Razer clearly sees the more powerful chip as an upsell at this stage rather than an across-the-board upgrade for every model, and that price is perilously close to the $1,900 you’ll pay for the brawnier 14-inch Razer Blade. You’ll want to think carefully about buying this model, then. Still, if you’re more interested in raw portability than playing Destiny 2 on the road, this is one of the speedier options.

Don’t worry if you prefer the Stealth but still want to plug in for some games, though. Razer is launching the Core V2, which tweaks its familiar external GPU housing to better serve as a general-purpose hub. It now has dual Thunderbolt 3 controllers that splits the pipelines for both your video card and other devices, so you don’t have to worry about the Core’s Ethernet connection or USB ports taking precious bandwidth away from your GPU. The V2 also accommodates a wider array of video cards, including GeForce 10-series and Radeon 500-series boards as well as Quadro workstation cards.

The new Core sells for a familiar $499 and ships “soon” to North America as well as France, Germany and the UK. That remains a lot of money to spend just to get desktop-level graphics on your laptop (the price doesn’t include the card itself, remember), but the V2 upgrades make the Core more practical if it doubles as a docking station for your peripherals.

Source: Razer (Blade Stealth), (Core V2)

Engadget giveaway: Win a Sense smart security router courtesy of F-Secure!

With smart home technology proliferating and cybercriminality afoot, adding data security to your home network is a wise move. F-Secure’s new Sense router can help monitor your home and provide feedback on the state of your network, IoT gadgets and even mobile devices while providing dual-band WiFi for your home. The Sense router monitors by device type to offer the protection for each connected product, from threats targeting your home PC to checking for unusual activity on IoT products.

Sense stays connected to F-Secure’s Security Cloud service to stay up-to-date, apply its file scanning services and AI analysis, while upholding its privacy principles. This week, F-Secure has provided us with three of its new Sense smart security routers — which include a one-year security subscription — for three lucky readers. All you need to do is head to the Rafflecopter widget below for up to three chances at winning this one-stop home data-security device.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

• Entries are handled through the Rafflecopter widget above. Comments are no longer accepted as valid methods of entry. You may enter without any obligation to social media accounts, though we may offer them as opportunities for extra entries. Your email address is required so we can get in touch with you if you win, but it will not be given to third parties.
• Contest is open to all residents of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec), 18 or older! Sorry, we don’t make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so direct your anger at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
• Winners will be chosen randomly. Three (3) winners will each receive one (1) F-Secure SENSE router including a one (1) year security subscription ($199 value each).
• If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of being contacted. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen. Make sure that the account you use to enter the contest includes your real name and a contact email. We do not track any of this information for marketing or third-party purposes.
• This unit is purely for promotional giveaway. Engadget and AOL are not held liable to honor warranties, exchanges or customer service.
• The full list of rules, in all of its legalese glory, can be found here.
• Entries can be submitted until October 18th at 11:59PM ET. Good luck!