Hey, good morning!
Welcome to the new week. Most of you are probably enjoying a three-day weekend, but the show never stops at Engadget. We have a team of reporters settling into Taipei for Asia’s biggest PC show, Computex, while we also look at the…
Back in the day, 17-inch laptops were all the rage. Sure they were massive to carry around but for users who didn’t mind the extra screen real estate, it was kind of a boon. However these days 17-inch laptops aren’t quite as common as before, save for gaming laptops, and Apple probably understood this which is why they stopped making the 17-inch MacBook Pro.
That being said, the laptop while no longer in production is still supported by Apple, but its days of support could be coming to an end. This is because in a report from AppleInsider, Apple will be adding the 17-inch MacBook Pro to its list of obsolete products come 30th of June.
For those who are wondering about Apple’s definition of obsolete products, it basically indicates products that were discontinued more than 7 years ago. It also means that hardware service will no longer be available for these products as well. “Apple has discontinued all hardware service for obsolete products with no exceptions. Service providers cannot order parts for obsolete products.”
We suppose that it’s time would have eventually come, so it was really a question of when, and less of “if”. We’re not sure if Apple will ever return to the 17-inch form factor but based on the current trends, you probably shouldn’t hold your breath.
Apple’s 17-inch MacBook Pro To Be Marked Obsolete June 30 , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Motorola just like many other Android smartphone OEMs tends to make devices that range in terms of pricing, where they’ll have high-end handsets like the Moto Z lineup, and they’ll also have more affordable handsets like the Moto E. We have been hearing a bit about the Moto E4 for a while now, and it seems that in the next couple of months we should have an answer.
This is according to a recent tweet by Roland Quandt of WinFuture.de in which he revealed that the handset could be announced on the 17th of July, 2017. This means that we’re a little under two months away from the phone being made official so we guess there’s still a tad of waiting left to be done.
Motorola Moto E4: more detailed specs, Canada MSRP is 249,99 CAD, interesting to see NFC (certain markets) and GG3, supposedly ships July 17 pic.twitter.com/IOCddU3o6L
— Roland Quandt (@rquandt) May 28, 2017
According to Quandt, he says that the phone will be priced at 250 CAD, but we’re not sure if that price will be the same dollar to dollar stateside, or if it could be more/less. As for specs, Quandt’s tweet reveals a phone with a 5-inch HD display, a MediaTek MT6737M chipset, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of default storage, an 8MP rear-facing camera, a 5MP front-facing camera, and a 2,800mAh battery with Android 7.1.1 Nougat running the show.
Like we said Motorola’s E-series is the company’s more affordable lineup so it doesn’t surprise us that its specs isn’t exactly mind-blowing, but do take it with a grain of salt and we should have the official details soon.
Moto E4 Rumored For July 17 Launch , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Earlier this year, LG launched its flagship LG G6 smartphone. The company tried to get ahead of the competition, such as Samsung, but it seems that in the process they might have been forced to use 2016’s Snapdragon 821 chipset instead of the Snapdragon 835, but that’s something they won’t be repeating next year.
In a report out of Korea, word on the street has it that both LG and Qualcomm have already started to work together and that come 2018, the LG G7 (or whatever it will be called) will be packing Qualcomm’s next-gen flagship chipset in the form of the Snapdragon 845, whose details have recently leaked online.
The Snapdragon 845 is rumored to be manufactured based on the 7nm process which is said to be 30% more powerful than this year’s Snapdragon 835, which if true should give the LG G7 quite a boost in power compared to the LG G6. We should point out that the Snapdragon 821 used in the LG G6 is by no means a slouch, but we guess from a marketing standpoint we’re sure that there are probably quite a few customers who would prefer if they could future-proof their purchases by getting the latest tech possible.
In any case we’re probably still a bit too early to start talking about the LG G7, especially with the LG V30 still having yet to be announced, so take it with a grain of salt for now.
LG G7 Could Pack Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 845 Chipset , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
This story is part of a series on ocean plastics.
For the over-stretched parent who doesn’t have time to puree plums or soak grains overnight, portable plastic packs jammed with organic and healthful ingredients are a godsend.
On-the-go moms can just twist off the cap and hand a pouch of blueberry flax and oat to a hungry baby to suck on by himself. No spoon or spoon skills required.
While these packs are pricey ― a 4-ounce pouch can cost north of $2 ― families are willing to fork over the funds for the convenience factor. But this convenience comes with another price: Most of these plastic pouches can’t be recycled and are destined for landfills ― or worse, the oceans. The demand is growing even though reasonably priced alternatives are available that can be used over and over again.
The problem with the disposable pouches is that they’re made from multiple layers of materials and the recyclable components can’t be separated out, said Brent Bell, vice president of recycling at Waste Management, the largest residential recycler in North America.
Empty food packs and other types of trash end up in the ocean due to a mix of mismanaged trash disposal and littering. When a person litters, for example, that item can easily blow into a storm drain, travel through sewer pipes and eventually land in waterways.
Stuffing loads of unusual and healthful foods into plastic casings isn’t sitting well with environmentalists.
type=type=RelatedArticlesblockTitle=Related… + articlesList=590816f6e4b05c397681f20b,5914b0a2e4b066b42172876e,591c586ce4b0a7458fa49711,58ffa383e4b0f5463a1a9472
“There’s definitely a push for clean eating both for kids and grown-ups,” Lindsay Gallimore, a mother of two who blogs about green issues, told HuffPost. “But all the buzz words that are associated with a ‘greener’ lifestyle are packaged into a packaging that’s not green at all.”
If the baby food industry doesn’t come up with a solution soon, the amount of plastic piling up from these products is only going to grow at an explosive rate.
In 2015, sales from baby food pouches reached $45 million. That was up from $8 million in 2010, according to a report from the Freedonia Group, a market research firm.
The demand for this niche product is increasing as oceans are being overloaded with plastic.
By 2050, experts estimate oceans will have more plastic than fish (by weight). Plastics are believed to threaten at least 600 different wildlife species, according to the Ocean Conservancy. When plastic reaches the landfill, it can take up to 1,000 years to decompose and can leak pollutants into the soil and water.
While plenty of plastic products are harming the environment, activists take specific issue with baby food packs because a number of convenient and eco-friendly alternatives exist, even for time-strapped parents.
“I can’t get everyone to use washable menstrual pads. I certainly can’t get everyone to use cloth diapers,” Gallimore said. “Feeding your baby healthy purees could happen in so many other ways that don’t require the little squishy packs.”
Gallimore likened the advent of plastic baby food packs to the K-Cup phenomenon. While some of these one-time-use coffee pods are technically recyclable, the process is so painstaking that consumers are more likely to throw them in the trash after using them for a few seconds. In fact, John Sylvan, the inventor of the Keurig machine, said he regrets the innovation.
“It was along the same lines as K-Cups for coffee,” Gallimore said of the similarities between the coffee pods and plastic baby food packs. “We were doing fine without them before.”
Before the plastic squeezy packs hit the market, baby food was mostly packaged in glass jars, which are recyclable, reusable and cheaper. Responding to the surge of plastic packs, a number of companies have developed receptacles that work similarly, but can be washed and used more than once.
Rhoost, for example, manufactures 4.5-ounce plastic pouches that can be filled with pureed food repeatedly and washed by hand or in the dishwasher. They run $12.99 for a four-pack.
Though most of the disposable plastic packs can’t be recycled, some experts say there is some merit to them.
They usually require fewer raw materials to produce than recyclable materials, which results in net energy and greenhouse gas emissions savings, Bell, of Waste Management, said. The packages are also designed in such a way to reduce food waste, which is where the “greatest environmental savings are realized,” he said.
Hain Celestial ― the company behind Earth’s Best and Ella’s Kitchen baby food ― is reducing its plastic footprint by partnering with recycling company TerraCycle. After consumers finish with their packs, they can download free shipping labels and send the waste to TerraCycle.
Since the products can’t be separated, they’re shredded and melted into a plastic and pelletized. That material is then sold to manufacturers who can use recycled plastic in their products, Lauren Taylor, TerraCycle’s global director for communications, said.
While this process is a start, it’s not capturing many plastic packages. Celestial sells about 20 million pouches annually in the U.S. alone, said Jared Simon, vice president of marketing for Better-for-You-Baby at Hain Celestial United States. TerraCycle has collected about 3.3 million pouches in the U.S. and the U.K. since it started doing so in 2013.
Even if those numbers increased, environmentalists likely still wouldn’t be satisfied.
“Recycling is awesome ― it’s great. But recycling is not the be all and end all of environmentalism. It’s expensive and it’s not a perfect solution.” Gallimore said. “Instead, how can we replace what we’re using and throwing away with something that we don’t throw away?”
— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
When Bungie launched Destiny, the game was launched without dedicated servers of their own. We’re sure that many were hoping that this would be something that Bungie would be fixing with Destiny 2, especially when you consider how many gamers have been asking for that feature.
Unfortunately the game was announced without support for dedicated servers, and this is something that Bungie has decided to comment on. In a post on its blog, the game’s Lead Engineer Matt Segur spoke about the game’s lack of dedicated servers, and elaborated more about the game’s “unique networking model”.
Segur writes, “Many are concerned by our announcement last week that Destiny 2 doesn’t have dedicated servers. While that’s useful shorthand, the full answer is more complex because Destiny has a unique networking model. Rest assured that we’re doing a lot of testing right now with players all around the world, and working hard to make sure that your experience is going to be smooth on launch day.”
Segur also revealed that every activity will be hosted on Bungie’s own servers, which means that problems plagued in the first Destiny, such as host migration, will no longer be an issue. Of course it remains to be seen whether or not Destiny 2 won’t fall prey to the shortcomings of the original Destiny in terms of multiplayer, so we’re definitely keeping our fingers crossed!
Bungie Addresses Destiny 2’s Lack Of Dedicated Servers , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
[Computex 2017] Convertibles, hybrids, and 2-in-1 laptops are a pretty common sight these days, but given that they need to keep a keyboard and a touchscreen display also means that they can get pretty thick/bulky and heavy, but it seems that the folks at ASUS might have an answer to your problems in the form of the ZenBook Flip S.
Unveiled at Computex 2017, ASUS boasted that they were the first with the Ultrabook, the first with the 2-in-1, and now they are claiming to have created the world’s thinnest convertible laptop to date. They are boasting how it is 20% slimmer than a MacBook, 55% thinner than a MacBook Air, and only weighs 1.1kg.
The company is also touting a new compact and more durable 360-degree hinge made from steel alloy. As for the laptop’s specs, we’re looking at a 13.3-inch NanoEdge 4K UHD display with a 6.11mm thin bezel, and an 80% screen to body ratio with a fingerprint sensor placed at the side. We’re also looking at specs like an Intel Core i7 CPU clocked at 3.5GHz, up to 1TB of SSD storage, and up to 16GB of RAM.
The laptop will also come with Harman-Kardon certified audio, speakers that are 3x louder, and enhanced low-frequency audio for better bass. It also boasts 11.5 hours of battery life, and a battery that can charge from 0 to 60% in 49 minutes. The ZenBook Flip S will also come accompanied by the ASUS Pen accessory with 1,024 pressure levels. The laptop is priced at $1,099.
ASUS ZenBook Flip S Convertible Laptop Unveiled , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
[Computex 2017] If you’re after a laptop that is equipped with the necessary hardware to run games at higher settings, or the capability to process high-res image or video or audio files at an efficient speed, then ASUS might have a laptop for you in the form of the ASUS ZenBook 3 Deluxe.
Taking the wraps off at Computex 2017, the ZenBook 3 Deluxe is the latest laptop from ASUS which they are touting to be the “most prestigious laptop”. The laptop will feature a 14-inch display and measures 12.9mm thin, and only weighs an impressive 1.1kg. It also has a 7.46mm slim bezel with a Gorilla Glass 5 screen protecting the display, which ASUS is claiming to be the first laptop to sport the glass.
It is made from aerospace grade metal and sports a golden diamond edge cut around the sides. As for specs, the ZenBook 3 Deluxe will feature an Intel Core i7 processor, up to 1TB of SSD storage, up to 16GB of RAM, and 2x Thunderbolt 3 USB-C ports, which ASUS says will let users power 2x 4K external displays simultaneously, or connect to the company’s XG Station 2 for external graphics if they need the extra power.
The ZenBook 3 Deluxe will also come with a glass-cover trackpad, a full-sized backlit keyboard, quad-speak surround sound certified by Harman-Kardon, and Smart Amp audio technology. It is priced at $1,199.
ASUS ZenBook 3 Deluxe Laptop Announced , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
[Computex 2017] If you don’t really fancy the idea of having to connect an external GPU to your laptop for the added power like with the recently announced ASUS ZenBook 3 Deluxe, not to worry as ASUS has the answer for you in the form of the ASUS ZenBook Pro which comes with a discrete GPU.
The laptop will be powered by an Intel Core i7 H-series CPU, come with 1TB of SSD storage, up to 16GB of RAM, 2x Thunderbolt 3 ports, and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti GPU. We’re also looking at a 15.6-inch NanoEdge 4K UHD display, 100% sRGB, and an 83% screen to body ratio.
Despite all that power crammed into the laptop, ASUS is claiming that the ZenBook Pro will be able to run for up to 14 hours (your mileage may vary), and it also sports fast charging technology that will allow it to charge from 0 to 60% in just 49 minutes. It also sports a quad-speaker setup, Harman-Kardon certified audio technology, and weighs 1.8kg, 18.9mm thin, which ASUS is claiming to be the thinnest ZenBook Pro ever.
In terms of pricing it is slightly higher than the ZenBook 3 Deluxe at $1,299, so whether or not the extra $100 for the extra specs/features is worth it is up to you.
ASUS ZenBook Pro Announced , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
[Computex 2017] ASUS just announced a bunch of new laptops, but some of these laptops are over the $1,000 mark which makes them out of reach for shoppers on a budget, or for those who don’t really see the need to spend so much on a computer. If that’s you fret not because ASUS also has some lower-priced offerings.
The company announced the VivoBook S which they are calling a luxury for everyone to enjoy, and a laptop that won’t be breaking the bank. It will feature an aluminum chassis so you don’t have to worry about sacrificing quality for price, and it will also feature some pretty impressive specs like an Intel Core i7 processor, an NVIDIA GeForce 940M GPU, a combination of an SSD and a HDD, up to 16GB of RAM, and fast charging technology. There will also be a 15.6-inch Full HD display.
However for those who want a little bit more power and oomph in their laptops, not to worry as ASUS has you guys covered too, and this comes in the form of the ASUS VivoBook Pro. It will come with a 4K display and feature an Intel Core i7 H-series CPU, an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 GPU, a dual fan design, Intel Optane memory, and HDD and SSD options. The company is also touting professional grade audio that is Harman-Kardon certified.
As for price, the ASUS VivoBook is set at $499 while the VivoBook Pro will go for $799.
ASUS VivoBook S And VivoBook Pro Laptops Launched , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
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.
