Urban Legend is making a return. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre reboot is already hitting some snags. The DC animated universe is venturing into another Batman classic. Plus, another new poster for The Suicide Squad, a new look at Antebellum, and Swamp Thing heads to the CW. Spoilers get!
Hardware startup Level introduced their first product earlier this year, and now they’re already following it up with a brand new smart lock. The original Level Lock broke new ground in the smart lock category with an invisible design that works with a range of standard doors and existing deadbolt external hardware, but the new Level Touch is the full package, with Level’s own thumb-turn and exterior key plate – and upgraded internals that add new smart capabilities into the mix.
The new Level Touch is available starting today direct fro Level’s own website, and is priced at $329. For that, you get a smart lock that comes in a range of finishes, including Satin Chrome, Satin Nickel, Polished Brass and Matte Black, and that includes smartphone control for lock and unlock, along with optional automatic geofenced unlocking, touch to lock/unlock, and programmable NFC-based keys that allow you to easily grant and revoke access on demand.
Level’s ex-Apple team hardware design chops are on full display with this new product. The outside design is definitely the most sleek and subtle smart lock you can find on the market – lacking even Level’s own branding, except for the smartly placed logo on the very end of the deadbolt itself (which doubles as the CR2 battery compartment for the lock, by the way). It’s a fantastic-looking product that should blend seamlessly into any decor, thanks to the various finishing options.
This is a huge improvement over most smart locks, which wear their smarts on their sleeve either with huge keypads, or bulky turners that house all the intelligent components. Level’s approach here builds on what it created with the Level Lock, housing smarts inside the door – but adds new capacitive surfaces that make the entire lock touch-sensitive for added convenience features. You can touch to lock, for instance, which makes it really easy to lock your door on the way out, and set it to touch to unlock when you have your smartphone in your pocket for added peace-of-mind.
In the box, you’ll also find two NFC-enabled keycards that can be programmed with access to your Level Touch (or more than one). Programming them is as easy as tapping your phone to the cards when directed to do so in the Level app, and you can revoke access to the cards remotely at any time if you need to. The built-in NFC in the locks can work with any programmable NFC device, so you can create your own keys using the readily available, inexpensive tags that you can pick up from Amazon, too.
Level says you’ll get over a year of battery life out of a single standard CR2 battery, and installation requires just one Phillips-head screwdriver. It’s also HomeKit enabled for Siri voice control and other smart home automation features.
We’ll be taking the Level Touch for a test ride to see if it lives up to how good it looks on paper, but this is a hardware startup that’s clearly thinking deeply about how to better integrate smart home devices into our daily lives.
Smart frames as a gadget category might seem like they’ve already had and passed their moment in the sun, but Netgear’s Meural line, which originated with large connected smart canvases, has a new entrant that breathes new life into the concept. The Meural WiFi Photo Frame is a 15.6-inch connected smart frame, with the same anti-glare ‘TrueArt’ display tech it uses in its Canvas line to present great-looking images that are as close as possible to print quality.
The Meural WiFi Photo Frame connects to Meural’s smartphone app, letting you send images to the display, as well as create galleries. Netgear has added a lot of functionality updates with the introduction of the new frame, including the ability to sync albums to Meural displays, meaning you can always have an up-to-date version of a favorite album on your phone on your Frame.
You can also schedule albums and playlists to change at specific times of day, and you can even send out invites to family members and friends to contribute to shared albums as well, so that you can automatically update the Frame at the grandparents with fresh photos of the kids, for instance. Also, all of these updated smart features can now be used with both the 21-inch and 27-inch Mural Canvas II smart displays, which is great news for existing device owners.
Image Credits: Meural
Also new for the Meural WiFi Photo Rame is support for both iOS Live Photos taken with an iPhone, as well as short videos lasting up to 15 seconds. Previously, Meural devices only supported still photos or animated GIFs.
The new Photo Frame includes ambient light sensors, as well as gesture control for seeing the details behind photos, and for navigating between pictures in slide shows. It has a built-in stand which can be removed for wall-mounting, and it works in both portrait and landscape – and will automatically rotate to both and display only the types of photos in an album that match that orientation.
The WiFI Photo Frame also works with Netgear’s subscription digital art package, and the device includes 100 free artworks without any subscription required. All the personal photo features, including shared and synced albums, are available free without any subscription.
The device is available starting today, either direct from Netgear’s own online store or through select retail partners, and it’s priced at $299.95.
Accessory maker Nomad has a long history of delivering great accessories for iOS and Android devices, using great quality materials and craftsmanship. Now, the company is partnering with wireless charging technology startup Aira to debut the later’s premiere product: FreePower, a position-free wireless charging technology. Nomad’s new Base Station Pro ($229) is the first product on the market with Aira’s FreePower tech, and I got the chance to check it out for the past week to see how it measures up.
Nomad’s Base Station Pro is a wireless charging pad that can charge up to three devices simultaneously. It works with all Qi-capable devices, which includes the latest iPhone models and most of the latest Android phones, as well as numerous accessories including AirPods Pro and other headphones. In many ways, it’s very similar to what Apple was promising with the AirPower multi-device charger it debuted and then subsequently canceled – but it doesn’t work with the Apple Watch, because that uses Apple’s own proprietary wireless charging tech.
Image Credits: Darrell Etherington
The Nomad Base Station Pro is just under 9 inches long, and about 5.5 inches wide. It’s less than half-an-inch thick, which is especially impressive given that it has so much charging flexibility hidden within (there are 18 coils inside). As mentioned, it can support charging up to three devices simultaneously, and has an LED indicator on the side with three lights to let you know how many devices are actively drawing charge at any time. Nomad includes one USB-C to USB-C cable in the box, along with a 30w USB-C PD power adapter to connect it.
There are plenty of multi-device wireless chargers out there (Nomad even makes a few) but the real advantage that Aira’s FreePower tech brings to the table is the freedom to place devices on the pad in virtually any orientation and have them automatically charge. Most Qi chargers require you to place devices within a very specific range of area relative to the coil or coils contained within the charger – and being off by even a bit can either cause a device not to charge, or make the charging process much less efficient.
The Nomad Base Station Pro is larger than most wireless chargers out there, but all that surface area is usable space. And Nomad’s signature dark metal and leather finishes are both attractive and practical here. With its single-cable design, this is a much less cluttered and more physically attractive solution to charging than a mess of cables and a multi-USB adapter, for instance.
Inside, Aira’s technology is the beating heart of the Nomad Base Station Pro. There are 18 overlapping coils contained with the charger, along with a layer of controllers on a circuit board that provide the smarts that make its position-free placement charging possible. Basically, Aira’s technology automatically detects what kind of charge any device placed on the pad can accept, and then directs the necessary juice its way, while also optimizing the magnetic field between the device’s built-in charging coil and the coil array found within the Base Station Pro for optimal power delivery.
In testing, it worked just as advertised, detecting my iPhone XS Pro Max no matter what orientation or where I lay it on the pad (provided the phone’s own coil was fully on the pad, of course). Ditto when I added a second iPhone, as well as AirPods Pro, and another set of wireless earbuds I have that feature a Qi-enabled charging case. You can even slide the iPhone along the surface of the pad and it will continue to charge, without losing the connection as the field tracks the device.
What’s ironic about this is that even though it feels like magic, it’s really what I had always imagined wireless charging would be like before I’d actually used any wireless charging devices. Current standard Qi-based charging is much more like having a slightly more convenient, but still essentially fixed dock, whereas Aira’s FreePower tech truly allows you to toss down your device and have it charge reliably.
There are some caveats to keep in mind with this tech: First, it’s not officially Qi-certified – but that’s only because there’s no current existing standard for free position, according to the company. They’ve done extensive testing to confirm that it adheres to Qi standards for compatibility, heat management and more, and Aira is working with the Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) that owns and manages the Qi standard to create a standard that covers free position charging.
In testing, it works well however, and charges Qi-enabled devices reliably, with the added convenience of allowing you to place them anywhere on the pad. That may not seem like a huge deal, but it really vastly improves the experience. Add three-device support to that, and Nomad’s Base Station Pro quickly becomes a unique (if somewhat expensive) wireless charger that’s hard to beat.
Aira, meanwhile, has big plans for FreePower, which includes providing the tech to a number of partners across consumer and commercial markets. It’s easy to imagine how well this could work in situations like coffee shop counters that are fully wireless charging surfaces, for instance, or in cars with charging center consoles. The company has big plans, but if this debut is any indication, those should pay off with big advantages across daily life for consumers.
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For those who want to live a key-free life without having an obvious smart lock on your door, Level Home might have the product for you. Level Touch, the company’s latest product, is a smart lock designed to look like a key lock.Some smart locks, lik…
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