Lego and Nintendo have been staples of millions of kids’ lives for the past few decades, so it’s no surprise that when the two joined forces, it resulted in a collection of building sets that are impossible to resist, including a monstrous new Bowser that fittingly towers over Lego’s interactive Mario figure.
Marta Kauffman, who helped create the NBC sitcom, has said there wasn’t enough diversity on the show.
Apple has announced Lockdown Mode, an “extreme” level of security designed for a “very small number of users who face grave, targeted threats.” It’ll be available this fall. The company says it created Lockdown Mode to protect high-profile people who, because of their status or job, might be personally targeted by malware developed by the likes of NSO Group, which is behind Pegasus, or other state-backed groups. Switching on Lockdown Mode will severely restrict the functions of an iPhone, iPad or Mac to limit possible entry points for spyware.
Alongside this, Apple plans to expand its Security Bounty program. Researchers who find weaknesses in Lockdown Mode and help Apple make it more secure will be eligible for rewards of up to $2 million. Apple sued the NSO Group last year to “hold it accountable” for states that target and spy on its users.
It’s part of several security features Apple’s teeing up for its operating systems this year. iOS 16 will automatically install security fixes, while the company claims its passkeys offer increased safeguards against phishing attempts and data breaches. Even on the physical front, USB-C devices will have to ask for permission to send data in macOS Ventura.
Given all the cybersecurity issues we’ve reported on in the last few years, these are probably all good things.
— Mat Smith
Ubisoft is killing online support for 15 games on September 1st
Horizon Forbidden West’s latest PS5 update adds a ‘Balanced’ 40Hz graphics mode
Extreme sports Apple Watch could feature an expansive 2-inch display
Netflix says a ‘Stranger Things’ stage play and spin-off series are on the way
With Amazon Prime Day less than a week away, Engadget will be surfacing the best tech deals we can find — both on Amazon and elsewhere — but there are some important things to know ahead of Prime Day itself, which begins at 12 AM PT on Tuesday, July 12th.
And to stay in the loop with all the best Prime day deals, try our regular new deals newsletter — don’t worry The Morning After is going nowhere. You can subscribe now to get the latest deals on our favorite consumer tech delivered to your inbox.
Good news if you’re waiting for Apple’s colorful laptops: The new M2-powered, slightly redesigned MacBook Air will be available for pre-order on July 8th at 5 AM PDT/8 AM EDT. You won’t have to wait long to get your laptop after pre-order because Apple will start shipping worldwide on July 15th.
Phew. The next God of War game won’t be delayed till 2023. Sony has confirmed God of War Ragnarök, the sequel to 2018’s dramatic spin on the franchise, will launch on the PS5 and PS4 on November 9th. To celebrate, there’s a new trailer, with Kratos’ son stepping up to fight.
Toyota is the latest automaker to run out of US federal tax credits, and it will join Tesla and GM in losing access to the $7,500 subsidy. The company surpassed the qualifying sales threshold for EVs and hybrids in June, according to Bloomberg.
The government limited each carmaker to 200,000 EV tax credits, though Toyota and other companies have been lobbying to lift that cap. Toyota says losing the credit will mean its EVs are more expensive for consumers, which will slow the transition from combustion-engine cars to EVs.
Following the lunar satellite’s successful launch from Rocket Lab’s site July 4th, ground control lost contact with the spacecraft shortly after it escaped Earth’s gravity. Yesterday, after nearly a full day in the dark, NASA announced its engineers managed to reconnect to the petite 55-pound satellite.
Whenever I’m away from my desk and dual monitors, it feels like an out-of-body experience. I’m constantly yearning for just a little more screen space. But when you’re traveling, what are you supposed to do? Sure, you can get a portable monitor, but that’s kind of bulky and largely redundant when you’re at home. Instead, consider the ROG Zephyrous Duo 16, because after a couple generations of refinement, it feels like Asus is starting to hit its stride with its funky dual-screened clamshells.
You get a big 16-inch main display with high refresh rates, top-notch gaming components and a 14-inch secondary screen for all your multitasking needs. And while I certainly wouldn’t call it petite, the Zephyrus Duo 16 isn’t that much bigger than a traditional 16-inch thin and light, despite packing desktop-level performance. Really, the main factor preventing it from being a great mobile gaming battle station is its price. That’s Because With a starting price of $2,500 (or closer to $4,000 for our loaded review unit), the Duo 16 definitely ain’t cheap.
As part of ASUS’ ROG family of gaming notebooks, the Duo 16 has aggressive styling, though most of the fireworks are only visible once you open the lid. ASUS’ dual-panel setup is a bold move at reducing anxiety caused by limited screen real estate. However, it does come with some drawbacks. Because the ScreenPad Plus dominates the upper half of the laptop’s deck, ASUS had to shove the touchpad in the bottom right corner. And measuring barely more than two inches wide, things can definitely feel cramped. Then you factor in half-sized arrow keys, shortcuts and media controls, and there’s a lot going in not a lot of space.
That said, Asus does its best to make the most of those areas, with the touchpad pulling double duty as a number pad. All you have to do is tap the shadowy icon in the top left for a second, and voila.
Still, there’s no hiding the Duo 16’s somewhat bulky chassis, which weighs over 5.5 pounds and measures 0.8-inches thick. These dimensions are right on the edge of being able to fit into a typical laptop sleeve, so anyone planning on buying a Duo 16 will want to make sure their bag of choice has plenty of room.
On the bright side, Asus has plenty of room for a healthy amount of ports, including two USB-A, two USB-C, HDMI 2.1, a microSD card reader and even a full-size Ethernet jack. My only complaint is that because of the ScreenPad’s complicated hinge, the location of the proprietary power plug on its left side can be a bit awkward. I really wish they had found room for that somewhere around back.
OK, let’s move on to the Duo 16’s displays, which provide a really compelling one-two punch. The main 16-inch display features a speedy three-millisecond response time. On higher-end models like our $4,000 review unit, you even get a mini LED panel that puts out an impressive 700 nits of brightness. And that’s coming from a screen with a matte finish, which typically lowers light output a touch. Meanwhile, thanks to a color gamut that Asus claims covers 100 percent of the DCI-P3 spectrum, the Duo 16’s primary display is just as good at pumping out vivid colors in games as it is replicating accurate ones in Photoshop.
However, the laptop’s real party trick is its 14-inch ScreenPad Plus, which supports touch and offers a 1950 x 550 resolution on the base model, or 3840 x 1100 pixels on upgraded configs. Our review unit’s ScreenPad registered 300 nits on our lightmeter, which isn’t nearly as bright as the main screen, but it’s good enough.
To get the most use out of its secondary display, ASUS packed the ScreenPad Plus with a ton of nifty features including shortcuts to performance and lighting settings, customizable window layouts, and the ability to mirror your phone’s screen, though that last one can be a little janky. Heck, there’s even a secondary numpad tool, in case the one built into the touchpad isn’t enough. And on the Duo 16, Asus upgraded the ScreenPad’s hinge so that it rests at a steeper angle when open, which improves both ergonomics and cooling.
Now all that’s nice, but for me, the best use of the ScreenPad Plus is simply providing extra room for social media, streaming video services, or anything else you want to keep in sight, while keeping my most important apps up top. When I’m gaming, the main screen is where the action is at, while having Discord and YouTube open down below are great for chatting with friends and staying entertained during loading screens. And if I’m working, the ScreenPad is perfect for stuff like Slack that doesn’t require constant attention.
Also, because the ScreenPad Plus is configured in Windows as a generic display, that means you can use keyboard shortcuts to quickly move apps from your main display to the secondary screen or snap them to the side as needed. Is it as good as having a full second monitor? No, but it’s enough to make things a lot more comfortable.
The Duo 16 makes it easy to log in using facial recognition with its 720 webcam and Windows Hello support. Unfortunately, image quality is mediocre at best, and as I’ve said before, 1080p should be the baseline for all modern laptops — especially one this expensive.
Thankfully, the Duo 16 boasts a powerful six-speaker setup with support for Dolby Atmos, so you get a performance mode in games that focuses on delivering accurate directional sound, along with a bunch of intelligent and preset EQs for movies and music. You even have the ability to create custom audio profiles, though, I wish the Duo 16 offered just a bit more low-end thump.
While a base Duo 16 only comes with an NVIDIA RTX 3060 GPU, our fully-loaded review unit features an AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX chip and an RTX 3080 Ti graphics card, not to mention 32GB of RAM and a 2TB SSD. So it probably won’t be a surprise when I tell you this thing is basically the fastest laptop we’ve tested this year. It notched top scores in Geekbench 5’s compute test, 3DMark’s TimeSpy Extreme and more.
Naturally, the Duo 16’s gaming performance is also rather strong, hitting 145 fps in Shadow of the Tomb Raider on highest settings and 85 fps in Metro Exodus on high. And that was with both games running at 2560 x 1600. So really, the only limiting factor regarding performance is how much you’re willing to shell out for high-end components.
Laptop | PCMark 10 | Geekbench 5 Compute | 3DMark Timespy Extreme |
ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 | 7,199 | 140,278 | 5,990 |
Razer Blade 15 (2022) | 7,085 | 132,272 | 4,798 |
Acer Predator Triton 500 SE | 6,779 | 125,001 | 4,887 |
Alienware x14 | 7,073 | 85,504 | 3,362 |
I also want to mention that while the Duo 16 normally keeps its thermals and fan noise in check, under full load, things can get a bit raucous. At full blast, you might hear a high-pitched whine coming from the vents that can get a little annoying. But you can always adjust that by going into ASUS’ Armoury Crate app. There’s even a custom fan curve setting if you want to dial things in manually. Alternatively, you could just put on some headphones and make the fan noise someone else’s problem, not that I’ve ever done that.
Laptop | Battery life |
ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 | 3:45 |
Razer Blade 15 (2022) | 5:42 |
Acer Predator Triton 500 SE | 5:25 |
The obvious downside to having a laptop this big and powerful is weak battery life. With both the main display and the ScreenPad enabled, the Duo 16 lasted just three hours and 45 minutes on our local video rundown test. That’s an hour and a half less than the Acer Predator Triton 500 SE and the Razer Blade 15, which themselves aren’t exactly shining examples of longevity. So you better make sure you save room for the Duo 16’s two-pound power brick in your bag too.
Look, with a base price of $2,500 that quickly climbs above $3K when well equipped, it’s going to be tough to fit the ROG Duo 16 in most people’s budget. On top of that, it’s big, heavy and short on battery life. But for the kind of people who constantly find themselves seeking more screen space — especially when out and about — Asus’ innovative setup gives you more usable display area in less space than practically any other laptop maker. And while its keyboard and touchpad are cramped, combining big performance with a truly unique design feels like we’re seeing an evolution of the desktop replacement notebook happen in front of our eyes. That means this thing will be a rather niche device, but if you’re looking for something to cure your dual-screen FOMO, Asus’s ROG Duo 16 does it better than anything else on the market.
Reddit is dipping its toe into the digital collectible craze. The site is launching a new take on NFTs with collectible avatars, one of its first forays into blockchain-based tech.
The avatars are designed by artists (many of whom are, naturally, also Redditors) and will be for sale in a new storefront. Initially, only a small group of Reddit users will be able to purchase the avatars by joining the r/collectibleavatars subreddit, but the company says it intends to open the store to all users “in the coming weeks.”
Though the company isn’t using the word “NFT” to describe these “blockchain-backed” images, it certainly sounds similar to other NFT projects. For example, Redditors can access their avatars via Vault — Reddit’s blockchain-based wallet — and owning an avatar gives purchasers a license “to use the art – on and off Reddit.” Notably, collectible avatars can only be paid for with regular old fiat currencies; the storefront won’t support cryptocurrency transactions.
Unlike many NFT marketplaces, Redditors won’t have to worry about wildly fluctuating prices, at least for now. Avatars will be sold by the company for fixes prices between $9.99 and $99.99, though Reddit seems open to the existence a secondary market for avatars should the demand exist. The company notes that artists behind the avatars “are also entitled to receive royalties from secondary sales of their Collectible Avatars on open marketplaces.”
Reddit isn’t the first platform to experiment with bringing digital collectibles to its users. Meta has begun to test NFT support on Facebook and Instagram, and Twitter introduced NFT profile photos earlier this year. YouTube executives have also expressed interest in the technology. Even Reddit itself briefly experimented with an NFTs-as-profile-photos feature earlier this year.
But so far most of these integrations have been focused on allowing users to show off their collections, rather than unlocking special benefits to NFT owners. While Reddit says that its avatars come with “unique benefits on the Reddit platform” the perks sound pretty limited, at least for now. Using a collectible avatar as your main avatar on the site will give your profile image a “glow-like effect” in comments, as well as the ability to “mix-and-match the avatar gear with other Reddit avatar gear and accessories.”
At the same time, Reddit says collectible avatars are merely an “early step” toward bringing more blockchain-based technology into the platform. “In the future, we see blockchain as one way to bring more empowerment and independence to communities on Reddit,” the company says. “As part of our mission to better empower our communities, we are exploring tools to help them be even more self-sustaining and self-governed.”
When Tesla CEO Elon Musk lamented about the decline of the America’s birthrate in June, he also made sure to point out that he was “doing [his] part haha.” Considering the Insider report published Wednesday night stating that Musk had secret twins last year, that very well may be true.
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has seen amazing things since it launched over sixteen years ago. It has cruised by Jupiter, peeked at erupting volcanos on Io, and most famously, zipped past Pluto, becoming the first spacecraft to visit a dwarf planet.
The Conservative Party needs a new leader and the country a new prime minister.
A massive raft of renders, purporting to show off Samsung’s Galaxy Watch5 have made their way to the desk of 91Mobiles. The site reports that we’ll see two models, apparently confirming a higher-end Pro model that will top the range. That unit, codenamed Project X, will come in black or gray titanium and get a single case option, but users can opt for a version with, or without, LTE.
The vanilla Watch5, meanwhile, will supplant the Watch4 as the more fitness-focused device in the lineup. Much like it’s predecessor, you’ll apparently get a choice of two case sizes and the option of an LTE modem, as well as a far broader variety of colors to choose from. Both units are expected to run a skinned version of wearOS 3.5, although there’s no word on if there’s any device-specific features coming at this early stage.
The rumors are pointing to these being unveiled at Samsung’s now-customary summer Unpacked event, which is expected to take place in early August. Between then and now, we can hope for a few more details about these watches filtering out of Samsung’s corporate shield. And for anything else about the range of flagship devices expected to drop at the event, as well.
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