Joule proves sous vide cooking doesn’t have to be intimidating
Despite the recent rise of affordable sous vide machines, the cooking concept has always skewed a little nerdy. Preparing food in vacuum-sealed bags in a temperature-controlled water bath sounds like something only culinary geeks would do, even if it results in perfectly cooked meats. By and large, these devices look and feel like scientific equipment: They’re bulky with large dials. They look like they belong in a lab, not a kitchen.
Chefsteps, a company best known for its online cooking school, aims to change that image. They’ve invented the Joule, a slim, stylish immersion circulator its leaders hope will finally take sous vide cooking to the masses. Chris Young, co-founder and CEO, likens it the original iPod. There were MP3 players even before that, he said, but it was the iPod that made digital music mainstream. “We want the Joule to be a thing that people actually cook with,” he said. I’ve been using a beta version of the Joule for the past few weeks (the final version of the Joule will have minor cosmetic differences), and while I can’t say it’s completely analogous to Apple’s iconic music player, it’s certainly a step forward in sous vide cooking.
The design is a big part of that. The Joule is by far the most attractive sous vide machine I’ve ever seen. In place of a large display, the temperature controls are relegated to Joule’s companion app, which results in more elegant-looking hardware. Shaped like a cylindrical tube, the Joule is sleek and minimalist, with seamless white plastic housing and a stainless steel top. There’s a curved indentation on the top that works as a multifunction key, while a lone status light sits on the front.
The Joule measures 11 by 1.85 inches — about the size of the tube in a paper towel roll. Compared to the Nomiku WiFi, which is 12 by 4 inches, or the Anova Precision Cooker (14.75 by 2.75 inches), the Joule is slimmer and smaller. It fits easily in a crowded kitchen drawer, which isn’t something I can say about its competitors. Seriously, that might sound like a minor detail, but as someone who’s played around with (and owned) various sous vide gadgets over the years, I can say Joule’s size is a big deal. The fact that I can just open my drawer to get it instead of fumbling around for it in the back of my closet means I’m much more likely to actually use it.
I also like that the Joule has a neodymium magnetic mount at the bottom. It attaches firmly to any metal or cast iron surface just by setting it in the pot, which felt really secure (plus it’s fun to do). But if you want to use it with a non-magnetic vessel instead, it comes with a handy wire clip on the rear as well. Another nice feature is a unique 360-degree water inlet at its base. This pulls cool water from the bottom of the pot and then redistributes it evenly throughout, resulting in a more consistent temperature. Even better, this means the minimum water level is only 1.5 inches high, which is a lot lower than on most other sous vide machines. If I wanted to, then, I could use the Joule in a shallower pot. That’s good for cooking smaller amounts of food without wasting as much water.
The brains of the operation, however, are all in the companion app. By default, the hardware connects to it over WiFi connectivity, you can always pair it via Bluetooth in a pinch. Setup is pretty easy: Just plug in the Joule, go through a tutorial in the app and it’ll connect immediately.
The app also functions as the Joule’s command center. There’s a series of step-by-step guides for cooking everything from chicken breasts to steak, so that even novices can make the perfect meal. Chefsteps, which is already known for its polished video tutorials, has imbued the app with several short clips that show you exactly how to prepare and cook certain foods. There’s even a feature called “Visual Doneness” which lets you see, in video form, what the food would look like when cooked at a particular temperature. So, for example, you can see the difference between a medium rare and a medium well steak before tapping the appropriate setting. The app also helps you figure out how long to cook the food based on how thick it is and if it’s fresh or frozen. If you’d rather not do the step-by-step guide thing, you can set the temperature and timer manually instead.
Once you figure out the various settings, hit start and the Joule will immediately begin circulating the water, heating it to the desired temperature. Put in your bagged food — I just used Ziploc bags that I sealed using a water displacement technique, but you can use a vacuum sealer if you like — and you’re good to go. And since the app also has notifications and timers, you can go about the day without having to babysit the pot; it’ll let you know when the food is done.
As much as I like the Joule, there are a few downsides. For one thing, using the app is mandatory, not optional. There’s no other way to set the temperature. Also, once you set the temperature using one of the step-by-step guides, it’s difficult to change it. You’ll have to stop the machine, set the new temperature and then start it again. So changing your mind mid-process is not ideal. If you do want to be able to change the temperature in the middle of cooking, you’ll have to go for the manual option to begin with. That said, don’t worry if your smartphone shuts down after you’ve set the temperature; Joule will keep working regardless.
As far as the food goes, I followed the app’s instructions and ended up with perfectly juicy chicken breasts, along with molten slow-cooked eggs. I could probably do the same on a traditional stovetop, but sous vide removes the guesswork.
Before Young created Chefsteps, he was the principal co-author of Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking. He was also the founding chef of Heston Blumenthal’s experimental kitchen, which helped create dishes served at the Fat Duck in England, one of the best restaurants in the world. A graduate in theoretical mathematics and biochemistry, he had a scientific approach to cooking that includes molecular gastronomy and the use of unusual ingredients such as xanthan gum and calcium chloride. It’s this unique take on cooking that has earned Chefsteps a loyal following of food geeks and, interestingly, the backing of Gabe Newell, the co-founder of Valve. In fact, Newell was an early investor and advisor in Chefsteps and made it possible for the company to develop Joule over the past three years without the help of venture capitalists or crowdfunding.
Late last year, Chefsteps unveiled the Joule and made it available for pre-order for $199, with a retail price of $299. But sales were so good that the company announced earlier this month that it was going to drop the price. Now, Joule will retail for $199, not $299, and the new pre-order price will be $149, not $199. Because of that $50 discrepancy, Chefsteps says it will refund almost $1 million to pre-order customers. It hopes to deliver the first shipments starting next month.
“If we make it expensive, fewer people can afford it,” said Young. “Our goal is to get this in your kitchen, to keep making you happy for years to come.”
Analogue Nt Mini Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET
Nintendo fever is back. Pokemon Go is a global sensation, and the incredibly cute $60 NES Classic Mini is poised to be a must-have gift this Christmas.
Yes, it takes actual Nintendo cartridges.
Analogue
But if your Nintendo nostalgia runs deep — and we mean pockets — there’s another product you should consider. The $449 Analogue Nt Mini just might be the finest Nintendo Entertainment System ever.
Perhaps you’ve heard tell of the original Analogue Nt: a gorgeous game console carved out of a single block of aluminum. A game console compatible with every single NES and Famicom cartridge, controller and accessory collectors have stockpiled over the years.
A game console that used the exact same Ricoh 20A3 and 2C02 silicon chips as the original NES, harvested from actual Famicom motherboards, to ensure picture perfection.
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Analogue NT is 8-bit NES perfection
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Analogue couldn’t make enough of the $499 Analogue Nt, shown in the video above, to satisfy rabid demand. There simply weren’t enough chips.
So its engineers spent 5,000 hours re-engineering the NES’ circuits to fit in a modern Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). They shrunk down down the aluminum alloy case to make the system 20 percent smaller, and added a 1080p HDMI output to play nice with modern TVs. (The original needed a $79 upgrade board to do that.)
The new Analogue Nt Mini even has a bundled wireless NES gamepad with an estimated 20 hours of battery life, so you can play from your couch. Wouldn’t want to get too close to that TV screen! Not to mention 16-bit, 48kHz digital and analog audio, plus component, composite and S-Video outputs for practically any type of TV.
“I can’t overstate how sophisticated our hardware is now,” says Analogue founder Christopher Taber. We can’t wait to test that claim.
A closer look at the Analogue Nt Mini
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Preorders should now be open at Analogue’s website, though we hesitate to say when the new device might ship. The original Analogue Nt was delayed several times, and eventually arrived a year behind schedule.
House Of Marley One Foundation review – CNET
The Good The House of Marley One Foundation offers unique design and a user-friendly experience. The addition of Wi-Fi expands the capabilities beyond simple Bluetooth competitors. The speaker is able to play at high volume without showing signs of strain.
The Bad You pay a lot for so-so sound quality, and it’s huge! You’ll need a subwoofer if you want to play dub or reggae. AllPlay’s streaming service support is very limited.
The Bottom Line The House of Marley One Foundation looks — and can party — like no other sound bar, but it’s way too expensive for this level of sound quality.
A sound bar that can play music well is sort of a white whale. Most sound bars are designed to be cheap and only play explosions and dialogue well. The nuance demanded by music is beyond their capabilities. Even the decent ones, like Sony’s HT-NT5 or the high-end Definitive Technology W Studio, involve some degree of compromise.
What about a system that’s built from the ground up for music, but can also act as a sound bar? That’s the intriguing idea behind the House of Marley One Foundation. The system is designed around wireless music — Bluetooth and Qualcomm’s AllPlay — but it also features a wealth of inputs for connecting your TV or other device.
We’re fans of the company’s design approach, down to the real oak facade, but the sound just doesn’t measure up to the price. Its bass is relatively anemic compared to systems with subwoofers. Further, treble sounds a bit harsh at volume, so despite being able to play louder than competitors, it doesn’t sound better. Add in the high price and massive size, and it’s tough to see who the One Foundation would appeal to.
Guess we’ll have to keep combing the seas a little longer in search of that elusive whale.
Design
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The House of Marley One Foundation features a distinctive thick slab of oak and offers a number of different streaming and connectivity options.
Sarah Tew/CNET
They don’t make speakers like this anymore.
Unlike other one-box speakers or sound bars you may have seen, the One Foundation is large. It’s like a log, the part-of-a-tree kind. A thick slab of varnished oak is bolted onto the front, which holds in place a pair of 3.5-inch paper drivers flanked by 1-inch silk dome tweeters.
If you mount it as a traditional sound bar beneath your TV it will block part of your screen if you don’t have 9 inches of clearance (and sadly, it lacks wall-mounting capabilities). It measures 8.75 inches tall, 31 inches wide and 4 inches deep.
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The speaker features a volume control on the top right of the device which glows in a color corresponding to the input — which, of course, is blue for Bluetooth. This is also echoed by another light at the base of the unit.
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The remote control that comes with the speaker is a simple rectangular slab with a couple of large sculpted buttons for volume and input selection.
Features
The One Foundation uses chipset-maker Qualcomm’s comparatively lame answer to Sonos, called AllPlay. As far as proprietary multiroom systems go it’s pretty low on the pecking order, with only Monster, Fon and House of Marley supporting it in the US (Hitachi and Panasonic are available in other markets for what it’s worth). Though the speaker was announced way back at CES 2013 the version with AllPlay onboard only appeared in the last 12 months.
Motorola MBP36S Remote Wireless Video Baby Monitor review – CNET
The Good The Motorola baby monitor works fast out of the box. It is easy to use, and one of the most affordable camera/monitor combinations out there.
The Bad The third-party app is basically broken, and some of the features weren’t even testable as a result. Even on the monitor at short range, connection issues are intermittent.
The Bottom Line It’s a fine basic device if you’re just going to use it in the house, without the app. Even then, though, the connection issues would make me wary of relying on it.
When I first unpacked the Motorola Baby Monitor and powered it on, I was surprised to see the base station screen on which you watch your baby immediately sync with the camera’s view. Talk about a quick setup. The next week of testing it out, however, slowly chipped away at that first impression, and left me with an overall negative opinion of the product.
For $180, the Motorola Baby Monitor should feel like a solid mid-range video monitor. Sadly, half of the features listed for the device barely function thanks to a terrible app and a consistently low-performing connection.
Motorola’s greatest strength is its out-of-the-box usability. Like the comparable VTech Monitor, it’s perfect if you want to use the monitor mostly in-home. Leave the camera pointing at your child, run to the next room to do a little work, and you’ve got a screen right there with two-way audio and night vision. You can even pan and tilt the camera using the base station, albeit with noticeable latency.
You start running into problems when you download the third-party app that allows for monitoring via your mobile phone. In theory, this should add all sorts of features, like push notifications, motion and audio sensing, and video recording for later viewing. And Motorola would be one of the only companies offering both a base station and app. The problem is, the app’s connection is so intermittent, I could barely even try out those features, let alone use them with any sort of consistency.
Despite the features the company boasts on its box, the Motorola Baby Monitor boils down to a very basic product. Despite the problems with the app, I could’ve recommend the monitor if the connection between the camera and base station were perfect. But even that connection suffers often, which leaves the product with almost no viable audience.
Panasonic Wireless Home Baby Monitor Kit KX-HN6001W review – CNET
The Good Panasonic’s baby monitor has a great app and includes a hub for further build-outs… if users want to make that long-term investment.
The Bad The camera has no pan/tilt control, and the app can’t make up for the lack of a standalone monitor.
The Bottom Line Although the camera performs admirably, Panasonic’s device simply doesn’t have basic design features that make other monitors so convenient — whether that’s a standalone monitor or pan/tilt control.
What makes a smart baby monitor “smart?” Some devices are wearable, measuring heart rates and oxygen levels. Some are app connected. The Wireless Home Baby Monitoring Kit from Panasonic, shows off its smarts by integrating with a larger system — the Panasonic Home Network.
At $180, Panasonic’s video baby monitor is more affordable than much of the competition. Part of the way it cuts that cost is by excluding a standalone base station monitor. Instead, users can pull up the app on their phones to live stream their sleeping child. Like competitor iBaby, Panasonic maintains an impressive app and reliable connection.
The problem is, when you just use the monitor around the house, your phone gets tied up with the app, which can be frustrating if you’re hoping to multitask with it.
Panasonic’s Kit also includes a hub that can connect with devices like door/window sensors, motion sensors, and more — all for a more integrated and secure nursery environment. Without those additional purchases, the hub really only functions as an audio alarm when the camera senses motion. But for customers interested in setting up a DIY monitoring system for their child, the hub adds a lot of potential.
Panasonic’s device has a few major drawbacks. Most notably, the camera is one of the few in its price range without pan/tilt controls. In other words, once the camera is pointed in a direction, that’s where it stays until you physically move it. The second issue is the lack of sensitivity personalization when it comes to motion and sound alerts. Under the default settings, I was able to walk across the whole field of view for the camera. As long as I went slowly, the alarm never went off.
The final problem with Panasonic was actually my first impression. Setting up the hub and the camera, connecting them on my Wi-Fi, and installing the multiple firmware updates required — the whole process took over an hour (yes, you read that right). I’m glad to see Panasonic updating the firmware on these devices, as it shows at least some level of ongoing support. But setup for a baby monitor shouldn’t take more than a few minutes, let alone 60.
Panasonic’s baby monitor isn’t the best device for its price. But for parents with an interest in DIY setups and large monitoring systems, it could be a good foundation for future investments.
Summer Infant In View Digital Color Video Baby Monitor review – CNET
The Good The Summer Infant Video Baby Monitor is affordable, and the basics work well for the most part. You can have it up and running in under a minute.
The Bad Reliable night vision is notably absent from the features, the resolution is low and there are some minor connection problems.
The Bottom Line The Summer Infant Monitor is a solid product if you’re on a tighter budget, but some missing features mean it won’t work in every situation.
With so many video baby monitors and smart cams that cost between $200 and $300, finding a product with both a camera and base station monitor for $130 seems like a steal. And that’s exactly how much the Summer Infant In View Digital Color Video Baby Monitor will set you back.
Of course, for a lower price, you’ll also get fewer features. That means no app connection, no pan/tilt control, and most notably, no night vision. The device still works, but the missing features definitely limit the use cases.
For instance, you can really only use Summer Infant to monitor your child from another room, because there’s no remote viewing via an app. Again, most people use monitors when they’re just a room away, but I like having app connection, so you can check in with your child when you’ve left them with a sitter.
The Summer Infant also won’t monitor a whole nursery very well, because you can’t move the view to follow your child around a room. Finally, the room must always be at least somewhat well-lit. Otherwise, you can’t see anything.
All these limits mean Summer Infant is best suited for monitoring your napping kiddo from a room or two away — and only if that room has some light. In that capacity, it works well. I especially like one design feature: a small LED strip along the top of the base station monitor. The strip lights up as the camera senses sound, so you don’t necessarily need to keep the monitor volume up — you can just keep an eye on the lights.
Besides the lacking features, Summer Infant works pretty reliably. Its streaming resolution is too low to see if your child’s eyes are open or closed from a short distance, but you can see major movements and hear sounds. Similarly, the connection between the monitor and camera sometimes cuts out, but in my time with the device, such cuts were rare and brief.
Overall, Summer Infant’s Monitor is basic, but reliable. You’ll need to make sure the crib has some light around it at night, so you can still see the baby, but getting a camera and base station monitor for $130 isn’t a bad deal.
North Face’s Access Pack was made for obsessive gadget lovers
A lot of backpacks and messenger bags now come standard with padded laptop sleeves. Whether that’s due to most people taking a notebook or tablet with them, I don’t know, but laptop bags are a thing, with an increasingly wide range of prices, shapes and styles. The North Face Access Pack caught my attention for a couple of reasons. First, it’s an established bag and apparel maker that’s made something for people like me. The company already has several backpack designs with laptop sleeves — and even battery packs — built-in.) Then there’s the fact that it’s been sold out for a while (despite the $235 asking price) on the company’s retail site. It’s in demand. So I demanded to try one.
The bag has a rigid shell that makes it look like it’s constantly filled to the brim. It isn’t. The Access Pack is constructed from a stylish mix of grey and black nylon panels, with the padded straps making it surprisingly comfortable to carry around all day. There’s also a clasp that goes across your chest, keeping the bag high on your back. It all looks looks cooler than it has any right to — at least for a brand that many of us associate with brightly colored windbreakers and navy fleeces. All told, the rigid shape and understated (perhaps too understated) colors make for a stylish work backpack.
The backpack’s primary compartment shuts with a satisfyingly meaty latch that’s quick to operate and quicker than drawstring toggle or a zip. It folds out to reveal a surprisingly wide opening, making it easy to dip your hand in and reach around. The laptop sleeve itself is entirely separate, in a padded water-resistant, zippable pocket along the back of the bag.
This is also where you’ll find one of the Access Pack’s notable features: pull tags for the pockets. When it comes to laptops up to 15 inches big, a hardy nylon handle at the top of the sleeve pulls at the base of bag, gently drawing your laptop toward you. It’s not entirely effortless — you’ll need both hands — but the handle means the laptop smoothly slides out without having to grasp deep into the sleeve for the machine. There’s also an extra zipped compartment in the back specifically for glasses or sunglasses, with a solid enclosure to help avoid any accidents.
The bag’s structured shape comes with a cost: It weighs around 4 pounds. I otherwise haven’t paid attention to how much backpacks weigh, but when empty the Access Pack is noticeably heavier than softer backpacks I’ve owned, which might not make it not ideal for, say, a quick coffee break.
It was fortunate, then, that I was auditioning this bag as a possible new work backpack. With laptops, adapters, chargers, cameras and miscellaneous technology to test, I need a lot of pockets just to make some semblance of order from a nest of cables. Inside the main part of the bag are two phone-size pockets (spare phone, battery pack), pen holders that I didn’t trust — pens leak on me — as well as a deep internal pouch that’s good for magazines and bigger tablet models. (My iPad Mini got lost in there, if that’s any indication of what can fit inside.)
As with the laptop sleeve, North Face added pull tabs to the two phone compartments and the tablet pouch. They’re lighter, rubberized tabs that have some elasticated give. The things you’ll put in here will weigh less, obviously, but I’m cautious about how much abuse these pull tabs could take, day after day. Two weeks of daily use didn’t break anything yet. Do you need these tags? No. But the laptop assistance, in particular, helps when you’re trying to get to work in a tightly packed cafe or even on a train or plane. (I’ll admit I didn’t fly during my time with the Access Pack. Apologies.) The smaller internal tags make retrieving what’s in them just as easy as if they were in the main bag compartment; the less effort I have to make, the more organized my bag will be.
There’s also a stretchy pouch just underneath the aforementioned latch that serves as an excellent pocket shrapnel and gum receptacle. Yes, I’m running out of synonyms for space, but we’re almost done. There’s also a pair of zipped pockets at the front. They’re both relatively narrow but deep, and while they overlap with one another, they’re completely separate: good for cables, maps and other slim items.
The hard thing about assessing backpacks is that how you use it (and when, where) inform what you look for in a bag. Everyone’s different. There’s no built-in battery pack for charging your phone, although there are plenty of pouches to store one, and the shell means it seems to bump into things and people moreso than other bags I’ve used. Those smartphone pockets are a little too tight for phones around the size of a Galaxy Note 7, and there’s no way of securing the main compartment; at least if there were zips, you could lock them together. (Yes, you can do that for the laptop part.)
The Access Pack is classy-looking bag whose design is centered around gadget storage and removal. However, you have to consider whether these convenient features — and modern looks — warrant a $235 upgrade. They don’t quite cut it for me.
Source: The North Face
iBaby Monitor M6S review – CNET
The Good The iBaby Monitor M6S has a great app and lots of bonus features. Plus, its streaming and pan/tilt responsiveness are excellent.
The Bad The camera has no accompanying monitor, and the motion and audio sensors are too sensitive.
The Bottom Line There’s a lot to like about iBaby, but it feels a little pricey for something with no standalone monitor and poor alerts. It’s still one of the best higher-end products of its type, though.
When it comes to smart home tech, you can usually go one of two directions: the big-name company route, or the startup route. For baby monitors, either way you go, you’ll get the same basic product: a smart camera with two-way audio, night vision, and a couple distinguishing features thrown in. The real differences lie in performance.
iBaby is probably the most notable startup in the video baby monitor market. Its premiere product, the $230 iBaby Monitor M6S, is just a camera — foregoing the standalone monitor for a well-designed app. At a consistent 1080p, the M6S’s video and connection quality is some of the best on the market. Plus, the device includes small but thoughtful additions to its feature list, like recorded stories and lullabies.
The iBaby Monitor M6S stands out in a few technical areas. It streams reliably even when you’re away from home, and also remains responsive to pan/tilt control. You can look around the room with an easy touchscreen interface (as opposed to competitor Samsung’s clunky touchscreen) on the mobile app, and the two-way audio is high quality.
Of course, iBaby isn’t perfect. While receiving push notifications based on sound and motion detection is a cool idea, it stops being cool when, even at the lowest sensitivity settings, every shadow or switch of the A/C has you checking your phone. I ended up disabling push notifications while I was at work, simply because I was receiving one almost every 5 minutes.
The second problem with iBaby is its reliance on an app. Sure, the app works a lot better than much of the competition, but without a standalone base station monitor, parents using iBaby to monitor a child who’s just a few rooms away will either constantly be checking their phone, or draining their batteries by leaving it on.
In other words, it might seem low-tech to have a standalone monitor, but it’s really handy — especially if you use your phone for work, and can’t simply relegate it to background baby monitoring.
The iBaby Monitor M6S is one of the best cameras on the market, but its lack of a standalone monitor leaves a hole that a mobile app can’t fill. Between that and the more expensive price, iBaby ends up being just good, when it could’ve been great.
Microsoft Sculpt Comfort Mouse review – CNET
The Good Navigating Windows is a breeze with the Microsoft Sculpt Comfort Bluetooth mouse. The wireless connection frees up your USB ports for other devices, its contoured shape gently cradles your hand, and the shortcut buttons will (probably) increase your day-to-day productivity.
The Bad The mouse is designed for right-handed users only, and the glossy plastic finish is a sticky situation in warm weather. Not all features work on Macs and Chromebooks.
The Bottom Line Microsoft’s Sculpt Comfort is a dongle-free Windows wireless mouse that delivers superior ergonomics at a rock-bottom price.
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Microsoft’s Sculpt Comfort is a dongle-free Windows wireless mouse that delivers superior ergonomics at a rock-bottom price.
Sarah Tew/CNET
If you’ve just picked up a Windows laptop or tablet PC and just can’t stand using the stylus, Microsoft’s Sculpt Bluetooth mouse is the best wireless solution we’ve found to free yourself from the cramped restrains of USB transceivers, because let’s face it — sometimes even one dongle is one too many.
Logitech has long been the Michael Jordan of wireless mice, offering the best mousing performance for the buck, but the Sculpt Bluetooth mouse is swiftly catching up with some clever features — like touch-sensitive shortcut buttons and the company’s own BlueTrack scroll-everywhere laser sensor — that makes navigating Windows 8 and 10 environments a breeze.
The price is an easy pill to swallow too — as of the time this was written, you can pick one up at Amazon or Best Buy for under $25, which converts to about £20 or AU$35.
Microsoft Sculpt Comfort Mouse (pictures)
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First, it’s important to note that this mouse is for right-handed users only (sorry, lefties). The shape slopes upward and gently rises back toward your palm, so it’s really comfortable to use for long stretches of time. The left side has a trim pad for your thumb to rest.
It actually reminds me a lot of the old Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer, in that it’s lightweight and molded to cradle your hand. My only design complaint is the shiny plastic finish can get a little sticky if you’re using it in hot environments.
See that blue Windows stripe on the left side of the mouse? It’s both a universal shortcut button and a touch-sensitive touchpad that registers up and down swipes with your thumb.
All the buttons on the mouse are remappable once you download the Microsoft Mouse and Keyboard Center software. You can choose to assign the Windows button to do things like open the Start Menu, launch Cortana, or access any of your applications or tasks — it’s really up to you to decide what works best for your day-to-day productivity.
Same goes for the thumb swipes, but I prefer to use them to move me back and forward in a web-browser window. Another sweet feature is the mouse provides haptic feedback (aka a little vibration) whenever you swipe it to let you know it’s registered the action. You can also disable it if you want.
Samsung SEW-3043W BrightView HD Baby Video Monitoring System review – CNET
The Good Samsung’s video monitor is reliable and offers a solid package of features.
The Bad The touchscreen doesn’t work very well, and the lack of an app means remote viewing won’t be possible.
The Bottom Line Despite a couple of weaknesses, Samsung’s video monitor is one of the more solid offerings on the market.
Buying a video baby monitor can be tricky. These gadgets range from $100 to $250, and their features are all over the place. Some have recorded stories to read to your child as they go to sleep; others don’t even have night vision. Either way, finding the right product is always a balancing game between the price and the device.
The Samsung SEW-3043W BrightView HD Baby Video Monitoring System is certainly more expensive than many competitors’ products, clocking in at $230. But it also offers one of the best suites of features. While a few major design limitations hold Samsung’s device back from greatness, it is still one of the better high-end video baby monitors out there.
Samsung has all the requisite features for a higher end video baby monitor: pan/tilt control, consistent 720p resolution, night vision, two-way audio, and sound alerts. Navigating the settings on the base station monitor to take advantage of those features is also quick and easy, as opposed to Motorola’s monitor.
A few feature omissions stand out to me, though. Most notably, there’s no additional app for remote viewing or video recording and playback. While that means the device is likely more secure, it also means you can only use it around the house.
The second problem with Samsung’s monitor is the base station screen itself. Unlike most competitors, Samsung boasts a touchscreen interface. But the touchscreen is so outdated that anyone with a smartphone will quickly feel frustrated using it. You have to press hard on the screen for it to register, and there is no swiping or scrolling. Instead, the buttons are located on the screen, rather than beside it. In the end, the touchscreen detracts from the quality of the user interface rather than enhancing it.
Despite those problems, Samsung’s device works well. I only experienced a few connection hiccups during the days I tested it, and none of them lasted more than ten or fifteen seconds. While $230 does feel pretty pricey for a video baby monitor, it’s a fair price for reliability.
AIVAnet 