Earlier this year, Acer introduced 3D vision technology they called SpatialLabs. Hey introduced this tech with a laptop that was not for sale to consumers, and have been developing the tech ever since. Now they’ve introduced a laptop called the ConceptD 7 SpatialLabs Edition, complete with a “3D Stereoscopic module for SpatialLabs” capable of outputting 1920 x 2160 pixel resolution … Continue reading
Acer has announced an expansion of its antimicrobial product lineup, unveiling new laptops, a tablet, a monitor, various accessories, and even an antimicrobial jacket. The expansion adds multiple product lines targeted at both commercial and consumer customers, Acer explains, adding these alongside the new Chromebooks and other products the company has unveiled. Acer’s new antimicrobial product line features the TravelMate … Continue reading
Acer expanded its “eco-friendly” computer line with new Vero devices this week. The Acer Aspire Vero was revealed earlier this year as an upgrade-friendly consumer laptop made with post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastic. Today, Acer revealed the Acer TravelMate Vero (laptop for business), Acer Veriton Vero (mini desktop PC), Acer Vero BR277 (monitor), and a series of Vero accessories. The Acer … Continue reading
Apple’s health ambitions for AirPods might extend beyond using them to boost conversations. Wall Street Journalsources claim Apple is exploring multiple ways it can use AirPods as health devices. It might use the buds as hearing aids, but it could also use the motion sensors to correct your posture. A prototype would even include a thermometer to check your core body temperature, according to leaked documents.
The features wouldn’t show up in 2022 and might not be available at all, the sources said. Apple declined to comment.
Apple would face numerous hurdles to marketing AirPods as health gadgets. The company would likely require regulatory clearance for at least some features. A US Food and Drug Administration ruleset due in 2022 might make that possible, but it could still take months to approve the earbuds. Even Bose had to wait a long time before it could sell its FDA-cleared SoundControl hearing aids.
There are technical challenges, too. Right now, AirPods Pro won’t last longer than 4.5 hours for listening (with noise cancelling on), and 3.5 hours for calls — that just wouldn’t be practical for health wearables that might need to sit in your ears all day. They’d also need to be comfortable for long periods and adapt to varying types of hearing loss.
It’s easy to see why Apple might expand the AirPods’ usefulness, though. As with the Apple Watch, health could be a selling point that grow the audience beyond the enthusiast core. It might also court a relatively underserved market of people who may have mild or moderate hearing loss, but either can’t afford most hearing aids or don’t like the limited functionality and drab designs that often define the category.
As part of its usual raft of hardware updates, Acer is adding new ConceptD machines with new displays and different chassis options. But the most notable product on the docket for late-2021 is the new ConceptD 7 SpatialLabs Edition, which packs a stereoscopic display. It’s the first time that such a product is available for everyone to buy after the company first teased the project earlier this year.
Back then, Acer and SpatialLabs teamed up to put one of the latter’s stereoscopic displays on the former’s machines. The idea is to enable 3D artists to preview their work in a form closer to the finished article long before it had reached the lengthy rendering pipeline. But while that initial concept was only available to developers who applied (and promised to share their work with Acer), this is a retail product.
The ConceptD 7 SpatialLabs Edition is packing an 11th-generation Core i7, with the option of a GeForce RTX 3080, up to 64GB RAM and up to a 2TB SSD. And users are going to be staring into a Pantone-validated 4K display with a Delta E<2 color accuracy for those who need it. Of course, this is only a sideshow to the eye-tracking cameras sited on the top bezel to match the 3D images to your gaze.
Acer added that, on the software side, it has updated the AI underpinning the system that enables users to view 3D content from any 2D image (or video) shown on screen. The company has also launched a new developer site to allow users to download all of the various plugins and tools (including a hand-tracking app and add-ons for Unreal Engine) to make everything work.
Of course, it’s not simply designers who may find the D 7 (don’t make me type it all out again) a useful proposition. The company says that it already has examples of companies using this as a car configurator for showroom use, architects using this to show off home designs and researchers examining high-resolution images from satellites.
If you want one of these, bear in mind that you’ll need to wait until December (if you’re in EMEA) or 2022 (if you’re in the US). Plus, you know, it’s going to cost: The starting price on that side of the pond will be €3,599 (roughly $4,158).
At the same time, the company is launching a new 16-inch ConceptD 3 model with a 16:10-ratio display and a 15.6-inch convertible edition. These, too, will be reaching the US at some point early next year, with base prices running from $1,700 through to $2,000, depending on your size preferences.
As part of its usual autumn laptop refresh, Acer is announcing a host of new Chromebook today that’ll roll out in the coming months. There are four models being refreshed today: the Chromebook Spin 514, Chromebook 515, Chromebook 514, and Chromebook Spin 314. That’s a lot of product names, but Spin devices can flip around with a 360-degree hinge, and the last two digits denote the screen size. That should hopefully ground you as we go through these new models.
Most interesting is probably the Spin 514 (pictured above), which combines a 14-inch 1080p touchscreen that has minimal bezels with Intel’s 11th-generation Core i3, i5 or i7 processors. This laptop has no fans, which means these probably aren’t the highest-powered versions of Intel’s chips, but they should still provide solid performance for Chrome OS. Acer also put some focus on the webcam, a wise choice given how we’re all still stuck on videos calls for the foreseeable future. It’s a 1080p camera with a blue glass filter and new noise-reduction technology to remove things like light flares. We’ll have to see how this works in practice, but given how many laptops have entirely mediocre webcams, any improvements here will be welcome.
Other specs include up to 16GB of RAM, up to 512GB of storage, Intel Iris X graphics and 10 hours of battery life. The Spin 514 weighs in at 3 pounds, so it’s not going to be the lightest thing to use in tablet mode, but otherwise it sounds like it’ll be a very good Chromebook — it also simply looks nice and well-built, at least as far as I can tell from these images. And Acer has a solid track record of making very good Chromebooks, so hopefully that’ll continue here. The Spin 514 is expected to arrive in the US in January and starts at $700.
Acer’s Chromebook 515 (which comes in consumer and enterprise editions) has similar specs to the Spin 514, though it has a larger 15.6-inch display. Given the large size, this laptop isn’t a convertible, which is probably a smart move. For a 15-inch laptop, though, it’s pretty light — only 3.75 pounds. It comes with the same 11th-generation processor options as the Spin 514, though it also has a budget Pentium Gold option (paired with Intel’s UHD graphics rather than the Iris X). The Chromebook 515 will initially be available in Europe this month for €499; the Enterprise version will come to the US in January 2022 starting at $640.
Acer has a few less expensive Chromebooks coming out, as well. The Chromebook Spin 314 starts at $500 and arrives in the US in November. For that price, you’ll get a 14-inch screen with an unfortunate 1,366 x 768 resolution, which is pretty unacceptable in the year 2021. It also features budget processors in the form of Intel’s Pentium Gold or two Celeron options and has a 360-degree hinge, as the name implies. More intriguing is the Chromebook 514, which pairs a 14-inch, 1080p display with MediaTek’s 8-core Kompanio 828 processor and 8GB of RAM. We haven’t tested a MediaTek Chromebook in a while, so we can’t say for sure how it’ll perform yet. But Acer is promising 15 hours of battery life, and the laptop weighs less than 3 pounds, so it does have some potential as a budget Chromebook (the 514 will cost $400 when it is released in December).
Sony has unveiled the FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II zoom lens that looks to be an interesting option for hybrid video and photo shooters. Designed for the company’s full-frame Alpha-series mirrorless cameras, it’s the lightest 70-200mm F2.8 lens on the market, Sony said. It also offers a number of features aimed at movie creators not usually seen in a lens like this.
While large zoom lenses tend to focus slowly, Sony said the new model uses four XD linear motors to deliver reliable focus that’s up to three times faster than rival models, and four times faster than the previous model on Sony’s Alpha 1 camera. Tracking with continuous autofocus while zooming has improved by 30 percent compared first-gen model, too. It also focuses quietly, so the motor sound is less likely to be picked up by a camera’s microphone.
Video shooters often need to pull focus between subjects, but lenses designed for photography usually exhibit “breathing,” or zooming in or out while changing focus. Sony said it designed the FE 70-200 F2.8 GM OSS II to curtail that, while also reducing focus shift while zooming. Such features are usually only found in cinema lenses that cost considerably more.
The lens should deliver nice bokeh thanks to the wide, continuous F2.8 aperture, while offering good handling with dual lens elements that move internally. It also offers three separate rings for focus, aperture and zoom, making it easier to rig for cinema use. Other features include high resolution, extra-low dispersion, aspherical glass to suppress chromatic aberrations, Sony’s Nano AR Coating II to reduce flares and ghosting and a new 11-blade aperture that produces softer, more circular bokeh.
Sony also offers FE 1.4x and FE 2.0x teleconverters ($548 for both) that extend the lens’s focal length up to 400mm at F5.6. The FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II zoom lens will go on sale in the near future for $2,800.
NBA 2K22 Arcade Edition is one of several games that’s bound for Apple Arcade in the coming weeks. The follow-up to NBA 2K21, which is also available on Apple’s game subscription service, includes a new mode called The Association. You can become the general manager or head coach of an NBA franchise and put together your own team by scouting rookies, making trades and scooping up free agents while managing the budget.
The game features current NBA rosters and modes including quick match, online multiplayer and Blacktop, a 3v3 street basketball option. In MyCAREER mode, you can create your own player with a custom look, position, jersey number and play style. You can run drills on a custom court to practice and level up your player in the MyCOURT mode. NBA 2K22 Arcade Edition will debut on the same date as the NBA’s 75th season tips off: October 19th.
Elsewhere, a classic iPhone title is coming to Apple Arcade this Friday. Tiny Wings first made waves back in 2011 as a one-button game in which you control a bird that slides down hills and launches into the air. It’s one of those simple-in-concept, great-in-execution games that works so well on a mobile device. It’ll be a solid addition to Apple Arcade.
Looking further ahead, Apple has announced the sequel to tower defense game Kingdom Rush is on the way to the service too. You’ll protect your domain from dragons, human-snaffling plants and other deadly enemies in Kingdom Rush Frontiers TD, which first hit iOS back in 2013. It’s coming to Apple Arcade soon.
Finding a graphics card that’s actually in stock is already a challenge, but get ready for the latest hard-to-find GPU: AMD’s new Radeon RX 6600 is here, and it’s tailor-made for 1080p gaming.
Could a Metal Men movie really still be happening at DC? Evangeline Lily thinks she’s finally clicked with Hope Van Dyne for Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania. Killer Croc lurks in new teasers for Batwoman. Plus, what’s coming on Supergirl and La Brea. To me, my spoilers!
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