Gaming headset review roundup: Five options, one favorite
As much as we’d all love surround sound in every room where we have a TV, it isn’t always feasible. Be it budgetary reasons or living in an apartment with roommates who don’t share your enthusiasm for late-night explosions, sometimes 5.1- or 7.1-channel audio is out of reach. Luckily, there are plenty of headphones to pick from. But that too comes with its own set of conundrums: Where does one even begin in that sea of choices?
We’ve rounded up five options at a variety of price points to help make your decision a little clearer. With this edition, we’re looking at the PlayStation Gold wireless headset, the Xbox Wireless Stereo Headset, the Astro A30 and A40 and, finally, the Blue Lola as a wildcard.
PlayStation Gold ($100)
The PlayStation Gold is extremely simple to set up: Plug the included USB receiver into an open spot on your PlayStation 4, power the headphones on and that’s it. Overall, the build quality is a little flimsy (one of the trim pieces on the headband fell off when I was unboxing the unit), and the hinges on the foldable portion of the band aren’t very firm. Add in the stiffness of the volume rocker and chat/audio rocker — not to mention the garish blue accents on the band — and it’s clear that the Gold won’t be winning any design awards.
Downloading the companion app from the PlayStation Store gives you access to custom presets for a smattering of games including Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Destiny, Batman: Arkham Knight and Ratchet and Clank. There are also some generic presets for shooters and fighting games, along with options for custom equalizer settings, movies and music.
The headset itself only has room for the built-in preset and one custom setting. That makes it cumbersome to swap from one game-specific setting to another. First you need to quit your current game, open the app, then wire the headset to the PlayStation 4 to transfer the new preset. It’s clunky, and honestly, the presets feel a little gimmicky anyway. Sure, some have more bass than others, or gunfire sounds a little different, but for me it wasn’t worth going back and forth. If there were room for more than one user-chosen EQ curve, it’d be a different story, but as it stands, I used the “Custom 3” setting for the majority of my testing.
How does the Gold actually sound? Pretty good. The virtual surround was plenty convincing, but at the highest volume, the ear cups were rattling on my skull. It was uncomfortably loud, even to my concert-deafened ears. The good news is that the sound field was detailed and there wasn’t any white noise at high volumes — an issue with other, more expensive headsets. As far as voice chat quality goes, my friends said I sounded distant, even though the built-in mic was only a few inches from my mouth.
My favorite feature is that the headset automatically turns off with the PS4 itself as a battery-saving measure, which is perfect for late-night gaming sessions when I fall asleep with the controller in my hands. The headset basically requires this: After two four-hour sessions I had to recharge it. It’s very much like the DualShock 4 controller in that respect.
Xbox One Stereo ($60)
Of all the headphones I tested, the Xbox One Stereo Headset surprised me the most. They’re the cheapest of the bunch, at $60, but for the money they offer well-balanced sound and solid build quality. Sure, they’re only two-channel, but a vast majority of (if not all) headsets boasting “surround sound” use software to simulate a 5.1- or 7.1-channel sound field from a few drivers. That’s because it’s tricky to cram multiple drivers into each ear cup while keeping the size, price and weight down.
Insert the relatively lightweight headset into the 3.5mm jack on your controller (or use the included headset adapter for older paddles) and you’re good to go. Unlike plugging a headset directly into the PS4’s DualShock 4, there are no momentary audio cutouts when onscreen action gets heavy. What’s more, the Xbox’s headset volume is incredibly loud.
I didn’t expect this amount of bass either. I’ll almost always ask for more, of course, but as I plumbed the depths of the research facility in Inside, the lab groaned pretty convincingly. Was the sound as deep as what my 12-inch Klipsch subwoofer reproduces? Of course not. But for a cheap pair of headphones, the Xbox One Stereo is impressive.
If I have one gripe, though, it’s that the highs sound clipped. In Forza Horizon 2, that makes squealing tires sound cheap and not nearly as distinct against the game’s rock and dance-music radio stations.
Astro A30 ($160) and Astro A40 TR ($250)
Astro has long made my favorite gaming and media headphones. The problem is price. With the home-theater-replacement A50s running $300, the number of people spending as much on headphones as they would on an Xbox One S is likely pretty low. For $160, though, you can get the A30 on-ear model with a Mixamp Pro. Or, for $250, the new A40TR and matching Mixamp Pro TR — which uniquely has a few streaming-specific audio options. These Mixamps are essential to Astro’s gear, as they’re an inline amp for the headset. They provide the power and sound processing and are basically what makes Astro’s gear sound the way it does. To bypass the Mixamp and plug either pair of headphones into a gamepad would be missing the point of why you bought Astro stuff in the first place.
As much as I love my pair of battle-worn MLG Edition A40’s from 2011, they had one problem that Astro still hasn’t solved: Each Mixamp or base station supports only one digital optical input apiece. The input situation is the lone caveat affecting anyone with more than one console, because switching between a PlayStation and an Xbox while retaining full audio fidelity means getting up and swapping fiber-optic cables. This quirk persists with the A30 and A40 kits I tested as well. Not only that, but the amps are powered via USB, which halves the number available on the PS4. This also means you’ll be stretching cables across the living room if you want to use either system from your couch.
The build quality on both headsets is top-notch, as always. But I had a hard time keeping the A30 from sliding off the back of my head unless I was sitting up straight. The ear cups also felt tight on my admittedly large skull. The bass response here never felt overbearing; rather, it complemented whatever was happening on-screen. Bass notes are deep and help round out the soundscape. Running around the Scottish countryside in Uncharted 4 with enemy dynamite exploding somewhere off in the distance sounded great, with tons of ambient detail standing out against thunderous booms.
Same goes for spelunking around a pirate cave full of dripping water and creaking suspension bridges in Uncharted 4. Both the A30 and A40 share another trait in that, in the Battlefield 1 alpha, the high-pitched brap at the end of a machine gun’s fire sounds a little crispy. Fully automatic weapons in Uncharted 4 sounded fine, however.
The over-ear A40 uses a different Mixamp that has an altogether unique sound versus that of the A30. Everything is deeper, with impressive dynamic range. For an A/B comparison, at one point I swapped the A30 into the TR amp and got an altogether different sound than I did with the stock Mixamp. Expectedly, they took on characteristics present in the A40, albeit a little less clear and defined. When plugged into their respective inline amps, both headsets sound great, and effectively block out the sounds of early-morning bird chirping and the fountain outside my window.
Neither is a bad choice; it’s just a matter of how much you want to spend.
Blue Lola ($250)
One of the best aspects of new video-game consoles is that you can simply plug a pair of normal headphones right into your gamepad. My coworker Billy was a big fan of the Blue Lola headphones, so I figured I’d give them a shot as a gaming headset. The biggest problem here is that on the PS4 the max volume level out of the controller is actually pretty low. That isn’t an issue with the Xbox One, however. The Lola accurately picked up subtle details like a hiss of white noise coming from behind a newly opened door in Inside, for instance. Meanwhile, the honk of a goose passing over France in Battlefield 1 alpha was distinct among the sounds of tanks, biplanes and other weaponry.
The plush over-ear design means that the relative quietness doesn’t detract from keeping ambient noise from polluting the onscreen action. Even better, the design and relatively light weight make the Lola comfortable for extended sessions. If you already own a pair, don’t hesitate to plug them into your gamepad of choice. That said, there isn’t a compelling reason to buy it specifically as a gaming headset — especially without a built-in mic for chat.
Wrap-up
Picking a “best headset” here is hard. That’s because the decision mostly comes down to how much you’re willing to spend. Each headset performs well and has its idiosyncrasies, but none are what I’d call bad. The Xbox headset happens to be my personal favorite, due to its sheer simplicity. But as you might expect, it’s at its best when paired with the Xbox One.
The overall crown ultimately goes to the Astro A30’s, on account of how versatile they are. Their lightweight, understated design makes them easy to wear outside of your living room, and at $160 you’re getting access to the best-in-class audio quality that Astro is known for.
Ben Heck tears down the legendary Nintendo PlayStation
We got a good, close look at the Nintendo PlayStation last year and even talked to Sony veteran Shuhei Yoshida about it, but have you ever wondered about everything inside the ill-fated game console? Ben Heckendorn, aka Ben Heck, is happy to show you. The homebrew gadget expert has conducted an extensive teardown of the cancelled system (the same one we saw, even) that shows exactly what it’s made of. While it’s evident that Sony had the largest role in the machine, this was very much a collaboration — you’ll find a mix of both Nintendo and Sony chips in this prototype, on top of the occasional third-party component.
Ben also suspects that this PlayStation wouldn’t have fared well even if Nintendo and Sony had put their differences aside. Although it would have had a much faster CD drive than the Sega CD (a whopping 2X!), it otherwise wouldn’t have been any more powerful than the cartridge-only Super Nintendo. That would have put it on par with Sega’s rival unit, or even slightly behind.
This isn’t the end of it. Ben believes he knows enough that he might have a shot at repairing the console (the CD drive wasn’t working when we saw it). If so, it raises the possibility that you’ll witness a fully functional device before long. You might not ever see it play native CD titles, but it’ll bring new life to an important part of video game history.
Source: The Ben Heck Show (YouTube)
Pilot a disembodied head on July 26th with ‘Headlander’
Headlander, the Adult Swim game with a ’70s science fiction vibe, comes to the PS4 on July 26th. First announced last December at the PlayStation Experience, it puts you in the head of the “last organic life left in the known universe,” according to the PlayStation blog post. Even though you’re just a disembodied head, you do have a spacesuit helmet and rocket booster. That lets you dock your dome on any object with a “universal docking ring,” including humanoid shepherds, robot dogs and even vacuum cleaners.
After that, you visit levels in the “Pleasure Port” with help from your personal assistant Earl, blasting enemies with increasingly powerful lasers or deflecting fire with a bounce shield. All the while, you’ll be trying to figure out who you are and why you’re the only human around. The trailer (below) captures the look, fun and nonsense of classic films like Dark Star and Westworld, and if the side-scrolling game can live up to that, it should be a hoot to play. It arrives on the PS4 and PC on July 26th.
Source: Sony
Mini review: Our 90-second verdict on the Sony Xperia X Performance
The Xperia X Performance isn’t a bad phone, per se. It’s just that Sony’s newest flagship doesn’t bring anything new to the table. For $700, it offers fast performance (as its name suggests), and the design is water resistant, so that’s nice. Other than that, though, you’re stuck with a middling camera and occasional episodes of overheating. What’s more, it’s missing some features you’d typically expect from a device in this price range — things like a fingerprint sensor, 4K video recording and a Quad HD display. Again, it’s not a bad phone; it’s just not good enough for the price, especially with so many superior alternatives out there.
NPD finally adds digital tracking to its game sales reports
For years, the NPD Group has tracked and reported video game sales figures. Every month, the company issues an email to the media detailing the top ten selling games for the month prior, total amount spent on games, hardware and accessories and year-over-year and generation-over-generation growth or decline. The glaring hole in those reports is that they didn’t account for digital game sales from places like Steam, PlayStation Network or Xbox Live. But that’s changing and with this month’s data, we’ll finally have steps toward a true, comprehensive picture of how much a particular title has sold, both from retailers and digital distribution.
It’s something that’s been in the works for five years, and the NPD Group has struck agreements with a number of publishers to track their digital data. Those include Activision, Capcom, Deep Silver, Electronic Arts, Square Enix, Take-Two Interactive and Warner Bros. Interactive. You’ll notice some pretty big gaps there: Bethesda, Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony. NPD spokesperson Liam Callahan said that if the group waited for everyone to come on board, that the tracking wouldn’t have ever launched. “If we waited to have every publisher in the world to sign up it would take forever,” he told GamesIndustry.biz.
In addition digital full-game purchases, add-on packs and micro-transactions will be tracked as well, but those sales numbers won’t be divulged to the press or public. And instead of separating the digital sales numbers from physical sales, they’ll instead be combined — much like the company doesn’t break down game sales by system. Games that come from publishers who aren’t disclosing digital sales data will be denoted as such.
Frankly, it’s about time that the NPD did this. As digital sales have ballooned (especially with the current crop of consoles), the firm’s reporting has been incredibly incomplete. With this, we’re getting closer to actually knowing exactly how popular a particular month’s games are in terms of sales.
Can you hear that? It’s the sound of the NeoGAF crowd and comment sections cheering over more data to scrub through and lord over each other’s heads come the third Thursday of every month.
Sony Xperia X Performance review: $700 worth of disappointment
Oh, Sony. The company has tried time and again to craft a smartphone that would find success in the US, and time and again it has fallen short. But when Sony pulled back the curtain on a batch of new Xperia X’s at Mobile World Congress earlier this year, I allowed myself to get a little excited. Maybe these were the right phones at the right time, I thought, and maybe a company whose products I otherwise respected would find the foothold it was looking for. After being underwhelmed by the standard Xperia X last month, I still held out hope that the high-end Xperia X Performance would be the phone Sony needed.
Long story short, it’s not. Don’t get me wrong: It’s a serviceable device, and in many ways it’s actually very nice. The thing is, a $700 smartphone should be able to deliver some modicum of excitement to the person who owns it; the X Performance mostly just leaves me cold.
Hardware
Even though the X Performance is the most high-end of the four Xperia phones Sony plans to launch in the US, you wouldn’t be able to tell just by looking at it. In fact, do yourself a favor: Don’t put an Xperia X Performance down next to a regular Xperia X, because you’d probably never tell them apart. From the 5-inch, IPS LCD display up front to the 23-megapixel camera around back, these two devices are nearly identical. Well, until you spill a drink on them, at least. The X Performance picks up where previous Sony flagships left off with an IP68-rated chassis that helps it shrug off dust and water with ease, even when you stick it under a soda machine and let sticky stuff like Coke fly.
Beyond that (and as the name implies) we’re basically looking at an Xperia X with a faster quad-core Snapdragon 820. That has its ups and downs, though: The chipset, paired with 3GB of RAM, gives the X Performance flagship-level horsepower, but the phone still suffers from some irritating design quirks. For one, you’d think a modern flagship phone — one that costs $700, no less — would have a fingerprint sensor for quick and easy authentication. Nope! The international version has one, but we Americans have to do without. Meanwhile, the placement of the volume buttons beneath the sleep/wake button on the right edge just seems dumb. Unless you’re a professional finger contortionist, it’s really difficult to hold the X Performance in your right hand and turn the volume down. It might be a mainstay of Sony’s “OmniBalance” design language, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a bad idea.
It’s not all frustrating, though. The X Performance’s fit and finish are lovely, and there’s something alluringly … friendly about its look. There’s a physical, two-stage camera button sitting below those tricky volume keys, and it’s generally a joy to use. On the other edge is a SIM/microSD card tray you can pull out with just your fingernail, instead of having to rely on a paper clip you had to scrounge for. That tray, by the way, will take memory cards as big as 200GB, which is helpful, since 12GB of the X Performance’s 32GB storage allotment is eaten up by system software. Since the X Performance comes with a more powerful processor, it has a bigger battery than the normal X too, if only just. Think: 2,700mAh instead of 2,620mAh.
Display and sound
I liked this 5-inch, 1080p IPS LCD screen when I first saw it on the Xperia X, and my feelings about it haven’t changed. It’s a generally great panel, capable of bright, vivid colors and deep blacks. We have the one-two punch of Sony’s Triluminos display tech and its X-Reality engine to thank for those colors, though you have the option to tweak the screen’s white balance and saturation settings if the defaults aren’t your speed.
While the screen Sony used hasn’t changed, though, the context around that display couldn’t be more different. A 1080p panel is fine for an ostensibly mid-range phone like the Xperia X, but some of the most impressive flagships we’ve seen this year came with Quad HD displays. Remember, this is a phone that costs $700 — if Sony could squeeze an honest-to-goodness 4K screen into the Z5 Premium, why couldn’t it have tried to at least match its competitors with a screen running at 2,560 x 1,440?
Resolution aside, I really can’t complain about the X Performance’s screen. The speakers, on the other hand, leave a little more to be desired. There are two drivers baked into the Xperia’s face for stereo sound, and most of the time audio comes out clear, if a little spacious. The phone’s maximum volume falls short of some competitors’ too — though, really, you probably weren’t going to use this thing to run your next party playlist anyway. Curiously enough, you can make up for that lack of oomph a bit by putting it down on a table instead of holding it. Seriously! A selection of show tunes I played seemed noticeably meatier when the X Performance was sitting face up on a wooden table. Or, you know, you could just plug in a pair of headphones. If you do, you’ll be prompted to go through an “automatic optimization” process that didn’t seem to do much during my week of testing.
Software
While earlier Xperia phones didn’t receive software updates in a timely manner, there’s nothing to worry about here: The X Performance ships with Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow. As usual, it’s obscured somewhat by Sony’s custom interface, and it can be pretty damn polarizing. For the most part, I’m fond of Sony’s use of bold colors and minimal changes to the core Android experience. Those changes aren’t minimal enough for some, though; my new colleague Cherlynn is no fan of Sony’s changes, stylistic or otherwise. Sure, you’ll have to contend with a few widgets enabled out of the box, but for the most part Sony has done well staying out of Android’s way. My only real gripe: Swiping right in the app launcher brings up a search screen with recommendations for apps you should download, and some of them are sponsored. Ugh.
That’s not to say the X Performance doesn’t come with extras. The upside to Sony’s not having an overbearing carrier partner this time around is that there’s no carrier bloatware in sight. Instead, the few pre-loaded apps here are welcome additions: The SwiftKey keyboard is enabled by default, for one, and the PlayStation app is there for those who want to control their PS4’s. Still, you also get an undeletable copy of AVG Protection that you’ll probably never use, and a Sony app called Sketch lets you doodle on photos you’ve taken. Why did we need this? It’s a mystery for the ages. If it were up to me, all high-end Android phones would just ship with stock Android. Since that obviously will never happen, we’ll have to keep dealing with custom UIs painted on top of Android. At least Sony’s is among the least troublesome.
Camera
As mentioned, the Xperia X Performance has the same cameras as the bog-standard Xperia X, which means it has the same issues too. First, the good: The 13-megapixel selfie camera is pretty great, and the 23-megapixel main camera can snap some vibrant, detailed photos in well-lit conditions. It’s fast to lock on to targets too, if not quite as fast as Samsung’s Galaxy S7 line.
For situations with moving subjects, you’ll be glad to know you can tap the target on-screen to make the focus follow it. (In my experience, it’s good for babies, so-so for cats and kind of lousy for cars.) And there’s really something to be said for having a physical shutter button, one that you can half-press to focus on something. They’re more or less passé at this point, but as far as I’m concerned, the more physical controls, the better. If you require even more control, you can switch into a full manual mode that allows for adjustments to white balance, exposure and more.
Things get a little less pleasant in the dark, where you’ll start to see a fair amount of grain and soft edges appear. Sony tried to mitigate this from the get-go by setting the default image resolution to eight megapixels with oversampling. This mode basically tries to squeeze the data of a 23-megapixel photo into an 8-megapixel still, but it isn’t enough to give the Galaxy S7’s a run for their money. And while the X Performance typically does well in bright light, there’s such a thing as a situation that’s too bright. When that happens, you’ll notice colors start to get washed out. Oh, and you won’t be using the Xperia X Performance to shoot 4K video — another flagship feature that’s missing here. The 1080p videos the phone records are middling too, so I’m not really sure what Sony was trying to accomplish here.
And then there are the camera apps, which Sony uses to inject some silly fun into an otherwise cut-and-dried camera experience. These range from AR applications that put dinosaurs smack in the middle of your office to masks that cling to your face through the selfie camera to a beautiful sketch filter that turns the world around you into an art student’s homework assignment. The only problem is that these features can cause the phone to overheat; when they do, the camera app force-closes to keep things from getting out of hand. At no point was the phone uncomfortably warm, and I guess I’m glad it acted the way it did, but I can’t remember the last time a first-party feature forced a device to behave so drastically.
Performance and battery life
Thankfully, the Xperia X Performance manages to live up to its name: It feels as snappy as other flagships I’ve tested recently. That’s all thanks to the Snapdragon 820 chipset thrumming away inside, along with 3GB of RAM and an Adreno 530 GPU. As usual, my week testing the X Performance involved lots of Slack messages, emails, podcasts and camera use, not to mention playing Real Racing 3, Mortal Kombat X and Hearthstone. The verdict: mostly great. Aside from those moments when using the camera made the phone overheat, I saw only occasional moments of slowdown while multitasking. The Xperia X Performance has 1GB less RAM than most of its rivals, which probably accounts for those occasional hiccups, but it’s also worth noting that Sony’s flagship was basically spanked when it came to benchmark tests:
HTC 10
Samsung Galaxy S7
OnePlus 3
AndEBench Pro
12,637
16,673
14,168
13,841
Vellamo 3.0
3,307
4,876
4,285
5,202
3DMark IS Unlimited
26,070
26,747
28,529
30,058
SunSpider 1.0.2 (ms)
710
608
1547
699
GFXBench 3.0 1080p Manhattan Offscreen (fps)
37
48
45
48
CF-Bench
40,252
49,891
51,227
41,653
SunSpider 1.0.2: Android devices tested in Chrome; lower scores are better.
As it turns out, the 2,700mAh battery in the X Performance is a mixed bag. When putting it through our standard video rundown test (looping a high-definition video with the screen brightness set to 50 percent and WiFi connected), the phone lasted only nine hours and eight minutes. That’s about 50 minutes less than what we squeezed out of the OnePlus 3, and hours behind the HTC 10, LG G5 and both versions of the Samsung Galaxy S7. Thankfully, the X Performance fared better with daily use. I’d normally get a full day of work out it, with notable bumps in longevity on days I didn’t use the camera much. If I was smart about what I used the X Performance for (note: this rarely happens) and used the included Stamina mode, I could get it to last for almost a day and a half. This is one area where the normal Xperia X outshines its more powerful cousin: I could keep that thing alive for nearly three days of light usage on a single charge. Guess that Snapdragon 820 can get pretty thirsty.
The competition
The Xperia X Performance is a phone with a flagship processor and a flagship price tag, but I’ll be blunt: It’s a terrible deal. Sorry! Between the average camera, underwhelming battery, questionable design choices and lack of a fingerprint sensor and 4K video recording, this phone is a hard sell. You’re better off spending your $700 on a Galaxy S7 or an HTC 10, or even a OnePlus 3 and a fancy dinner. One could even make the argument that you’re better off buying a year-old Sony phone like the Z5 Premium: It has a stunning 4K display, shoots 4K video and boasts a bigger battery for far less than $700. Sure, you’d be giving up an improved front-facing camera and the latest version of Android, but some people probably wouldn’t mind the trade-offs at all.
Wrap-up
If anyone from Sony is reading this, here’s a serious question: What were you trying to accomplish with the X Performance? It’s a perfectly passable flagship, but is this really the sort of flagship you want your name attached to? I don’t mean to be overly harsh, because in most ways the Xperia X Performance is an adequate phone. The bigger issue is whether a phone that costs $700 should really just be “adequate.” I’d argue no. Sony’s competitors are busy innovating just to maintain some sort of edge over one another, be it Samsung devoting resources to building first-class cameras, HTC constantly refining its approach to software or LG basically throwing caution to the wind. And here’s Sony, with a smartphone that costs just as much as the others and brings nothing new to the table. The Xperia X Performance is far from a bad phone; it’s just halfhearted, and that won’t get Sony anywhere.
Sony is resurrecting its robots for a full financial recovery
Sony is back in the robotics race. The consumer company gave us AIBO, one of the most popular “entertainment” robotic dogs, in the late ’90s. But due to heavy losses and a corporate restructure in 2006, the canine bot and all related AI efforts were scaled back. Now a decade later, as the company powers through its financial troubles, it is renewing its commitment to consumer robots and artificial intelligence. This week, CEO Kazuo Hirai announced that Sony has re-established a corporate arm dedicated to robotics. While he didn’t spell out the nature of the bots that will be rolled out, he mentioned that they will be “capable of forming an emotional bond with customers.”
According to a Wall Street Journal report, Hirai also mentioned that the robotics strategy will follow the company’s “recurring” products theme, which indicates a repeat purchasing model that brings consumers back for more. While the electronics company is banking on its hardware strengths, they also invested in an American AI startup called Cogitai that is dedicated to developing smart systems that can continually learn from their own experiences in the world.
Sony adds cheaper 4K TVs to its lineup
Sony started 2016 by showing off some high-end 4K TVs with HDR, and with the arrival of summer it’s time to see cheaper versions pop up on store shelves. The company says the new 800D, 750D and 700D are entry-level models for its premium XBR line, however only the 800D TVs will ship with HDR-10 support that offers enhanced colors and contrast on things like Ultra HD Blu-ray, Netflix/Amazon streaming and even some games — the other two versions will get it in a firmware upgrade later this year. They’re all Android TVs just like their higher-end cousins, with support for Google Cast and even Logitech’s Harmony Hub app.
In terms of price, the 65-inch 750D has an MSRP of $2,300, although it’s price is actually listed at $1,500 on Sony’s website. The high-end 930D we saw at CES has a listed price of $2,800 (along with better backlighting, Sony’s Triluminos display tech and the usual extras), so it’s quite a bit cheaper. On the other hand, Vizio’s midrange 65-inch M-Series 4K TV also costs $1,500 and comes with an Android tablet remote and support for Dolby Vision HDR instead of HDR-10 (yes, there’s another standards skirmish going on), and it’s available right now — so choose wisely. The Sony TVs are ready for pre-order now, with plans to go on sale through Amazon, Best Buy and other retailers in July.
Models and Prices
- XBR-49X800D, 49″ class (48.5″ diag) , $1,499.99 MSRP (Listed price: $750)
- XBR-43X800D, 43″ class (42.5″ diag), $1,299.99 MSRP (Listed price: $900)
- XBR-65X750D, 65″ class (64.5″ diag), $2,299.99 MSRP (Listed price: $1,500)
- XBR-55X700D, 55″ class (54.6″ diag), $1,499.99 MSRP (Listed price: $900)
- XBR-49X700D, 49″ class (48.5″ diag), $999.99 MSRP (Listed price: $800)
Source: Sony Blog
Stream PS Vue’s cord-cutting service from your Android device
Sony’s attempt at killing your pay-tv subscription is available on Android now — just like the company promised. What’s more, PlayStation Vue also has a few new features on the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4. On the former, the channel guide has a video window in the upper right now, so you can keep an eye on what you were watching as you scroll through other viewing options. It’s essentially what cable and satellite guides have offered for years. If you’re using your PS3 as a media machine, the addition of a quick navigation overlay, which offers a “last channel” option among other tweaks, should be welcome; it’s also available on PS4.
Using the app on a second-gen Fire TV? You’ll find 60 FPS video support in addition to the aforementioned quick nav overlay next time you access the service. Sony says that a few of these new bits were the result of fan-requests, so maybe, just maybe, the outfit will hear the pleas for Android TV and Apple TV apps next.
Source: Google Play, PlayStation Blog
Last PlayStation VR pre-orders start on June 30th
Did you miss out on the first round of PlayStation VR pre-orders, but remain determined to get Sony’s virtual reality headset on launch day? You have one last (official) chance to make it happen. Sony has reiterated that its final wave of American PSVR pre-orders starts on June 30th at 10AM Eastern, when you can snag the PS4 wearable through GameStop’s website. The company is promising that stores will have units on release should you miss out, but let’s be honest — if you’re an early adopter, you probably don’t want to risk going VR-free come October 13th.
Source: PlayStation Blog
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