Samsung promised at CES last January that it would deliver a 110-inch UHDTV this year, and with just a couple of days left to spare here it is. Apparently rolling out in China, the Middle East and a few European countries first, there’s no word on …
Our devices have a never-ending hunger for power – it’s their single greatest failing, in a time when they can do incredible things but still only last around a day of solid use in the best-case scenario. But Mophie has made a name for itself providing extra juice for your devices, and now they’ve got a new Powerstation XL model that packs a crazy 12,000 mAh, which can charge some smartphones up to eight times over.
Pros:
Cons:
Mophie’s Powerstation XL isn’t reinventing the wheel, it’s just making the wheel a lot bigger. Even design-wise, it resembles previous Mophie power pack devices, with a rubberized black top and bottom ‘sandwiching’ a silver wraparound rim. A button on the side will light up an LED indicator to tell you how much juice is remaining (to the nearest quarter), and two USB 2.0 ports on the top can charge up to two devices simultaneously, while a micro USB input is used to fill it back up once it’s empty.
The sandwich look is simple, good and a nice fit with Apple products, with which I’m generally using the Mophie Powerstation XL. Plus, the whole thing feels terrifically well-built, and you can imagine that if you pop the lid, it’ll be tightly packed edge to edge with battery cell units. Mophie’s backup batteries feel like they can survive a fall, which is more than you can say for a lot of the lower-priced models it competes with.
And the Mophie Powerstation XL also works as advertised. I used the partial charge it came with to fully reenergize a Nexus 5, HTC One and Nvidia Shield before it exhausted itself, and subsequent charges have managed to serve up multiple charges to my iPhone 5 while also topping up an iPad Air on the run. Plus, in terms of charge retention, you can easily have the XL in a bag for days without it losing a single dot of its energy meter to dissipation.
Mophie does good retention, and good overall life of the bank itself, which is why they can get away with asking for $130 for a backup battery and someone like IOgear charges a lot less. The XL is brand new, so I haven’t had the opportunity to test its longevity yet, but the Powerstation Pro I’ve had now for a couple of years still seems not to be noticeably diminished vs. when I first bought it.
The bottom line is that if you need serious backup juice in a relatively small package that’s bound to be reliable, Mophie’s latest delivers. It’d be great if someone made a smartphone that eliminated the need for such a thing, but until then, at least there’s the Powerstation XL.
Google and Audi will together be making some announcements at CES 2014 regarding their future collaborative efforts. Chief among them: an Android-based dashboard system. In essence, Audi owners will be … Continue reading
Thought using the Wii U GamePad as a simple PC controller was a neat trick? Try this on for size: a small team of hackers has figured out how to stream PC games to the tablet-esque controller natively, circumventing its host console. The hack was …
There are a lot of smartphone breathalyzers out there, but they don’t tend to prioritize design aesthetic. It’s more of an ‘am I too drunk, yes or no,’ kind of thing. But the Lapka Bam Breathalyzer is all about bringing form and function together.
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You might say the week is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workweek, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Weekly Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past seven days — all …
As it stands, EA does not sell their Battlefield 4 game in China, which is why we think the China government’s plans to ban the game should have little to no effect on EA’s business. So why is China banning the game? Well as you guys might have heard, the latest Battlefield 4 DLC has been named “China Rising” and it is DLC that contains new maps, vehicles, assignments, and weapons, and follows the fictional story of a certain Admiral Chang who has plans on overthrowing the government. The keyword here is fictional but apparently China is having none of it and have accused EA of creating a form of cultural invasion.
This has led the government to a decision to ban all forms of Battlefield 4 content, such as the prohibition of sales of physical copies of the game and other related demos, downloadable content, and even news! The game has even been characterized as illegal on the grounds that it endangers national security and cultural aggression. China has never been shy about censoring or banning products in the past, which explains why companies such as Google and Facebook have had no luck penetrating the market. Even developers like Blizzard had to alter their games, such as World of Warcraft, in order to meet the requirements set out by the Chinese government. In any case like we said, since EA doesn’t sell the game in China to begin with, we’re not sure if this ban has any effect on them.
Battlefield 4 Banned In China Over Latest DLC original content from Ubergizmo. 
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The other day we reported on a rumor that Minecraft would be making its way onto Nintendo’s Wii U platform in the near future. This sort of made sense because not only would this spread the game’s popularity, but also because of the Wii U’s GamePad which would allow gamers to perform a variety of Minecraft actions on it, such as crafting new objects, for example. Like we said it did make sense but unfortunately the rumor has proven to be nothing but a rumor, as Minecraft’s creator, Markus “Notch” Persson, has revealed that Mojang has no plans on porting Minecraft onto the Wii U anytime soon.
Responding to fan requests on Twitter to bring the game onto Nintendo’s platform, Persson was quoted as saying, “I agree a Wii U version would make sense, btw. The only reason for no current plans is we’ve got too much work already. I <3 Nintendo.” According to earlier rumors, the game was said to be in the works as Nintendo had reportedly sent several Wii U development kits to Mojang to help them port the game onto the Wii U console, but alas it looks like that will not be happening. Persson does not completely rule out the possibility, at least based on his statement, but for now Wii U gamers and Minecraft fans will have to be content with Minecraft that is available on other platforms, such as the PC, Xbox 360, PS3, and come 2014, the Xbox One and PS4 as well.
Notch Confirms Minecraft For Wii U Not In The Works original content from Ubergizmo. 
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Just because one is good at something in real life, it doesn’t mean that they are good at it in virtual reality. For example there are real life guitarists of legendary statuses who might actually lose out to a gamer in a game of Guitar Hero, but regardless it’s still an interesting comparison to make nonetheless. Looking to test the driving skills of a virtual racer against a real life racer, Viagame took one of Sweden’s best gaming drivers, Fredrik Brolin, and pitted him against the likes of real world racing pro, Peter Ternstrom.
The goal was to see who would finish first and instead of both drivers playing the game, Brolin would play the game, while Ternstrom would drive in real life around the same track, Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona. However the kicker is that both drivers would be in the same car, meaning that Brolin had to play his video game while Ternstrom was in the driver’s seat. We reckon this is a disadvantage to Brolin who had to concentrate on the game while being jerked around in the car as it was driven and made corners, but it was still a pretty interesting competition nonetheless. Who do you think won? For those curious about the outcome, you can check out their competition in the video above.
Real World Racer Races Against A Video Game Racer original content from Ubergizmo. 
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People attribute a lot of annoying internet stuff to bots. Twitterbot followers, bots that sneak past spam filters, bots that send weird gibberish on messaging services. It sounds kind of tired, but maybe the situation is exactly as bad as everyone thinks.
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This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
