Author: Admin

The M2 15-inch MacBook Air is among the best laptops you can buy for the vast majority of people right now — and that’s when it’s at its normal price. But right now, with $200 off? It’s impossible to beat.

Amazon is now selling the M2 15-inch MacBook Air for just $1,099, which is a big discount on the price that you’d normally pay. In fact, this is the lowest price that the online retailer has ever offered this particular laptop for, and you even get to choose from all four colors. Although, really, we all know that midnight is the only one you should pick. But it’s your money, your choice!

No matter which color you choose, the laptop will be the same on the inside, including that super-speedy M2 Apple silicon with its eight-core CPU and 10-core GPU. You’ll also get 8GB of RAM and a fast 256GB solid-state drive thrown in as well.

There’s more, too. This 15-inch MacBook Air is silent thanks to the lack of a single fan, while the 15.3-inch Liquid Retina display offers 500 nits of brightness and support for P3 wide color. Battery life is plentiful as well, with Apple saying you can expect up to 18 hours from a single charge.

Apple’s new laptop comes with MacOS Ventura installed out of the box and will support MacOS Sonoma when it’s released in a month or two, while your new Mac will work seamlessly with things like the iPhone, iPad and even the Apple Watch.

Amazon hasn’t said how long this price will be in effect, but considering it’s the lowest yet, we don’t expect it to be for long.

While most people are waiting for Apple to release iOS 17 in the coming weeks, the tech giant still released iOS 16.6 on July 27. The update doesn’t bring many new features to your iPhone, but it includes a lot of bug fixes and security patches, with some for a few issues Apple said might be actively exploited.

To download the update, got to Settings > General > Software Update, tap Install Now and follow the onscreen prompts.

Apple said the iPhone update patches two issues that might be actively exploited. One issue is in WebKit — the engine that powers Safari and other third-party browsers on iOS — and might lead to an arbitrary code execution. That means a third party could steal your data or hack your device for other nefarious purposes, according to the IT services company Okta. The second issue allowed an app to modify your iPhone’s core iOS code, called the kernel.

The update also fixes other issues, including one with the Find My app where an app might be able to read your sensitive location information. Apple doesn’t say this was actively exploited, but you should still download iOS 16.6 to fix this issue.

What else is new on iOS 16.6?

Other than patches and fixes, iOS 16.6 doesn’t bring many new features to your iPhone. An early beta version of iOS 16.6 appeared to have some of the framework for iMessage Contact Key Verification. But that framework isn’t included in the final version of iOS 16.6.

There are some new prompt messages in iOS 16.6 that you might see, like if you try to log into iCloud for Windows when your iPhone and Windows computer aren’t on the same Wi-Fi network.

The website Gadget Hacks also reports there are new alerts for Apple Card, Apple Card Family Sharing and Apple Card Savings. Some of those new alerts include a prompt asking you to verify a purchase with your Apple Card and a prompt asking you to complete your savings account information by including your employment status and source of income.

For more iOS news, check out when Apple might release iOS 17, features we’re most excited about in iOS 17 and five hidden iOS 17 features you should know about.

TCL is revealing its first phones with NxtPaper screens Tuesday, which the company says will have a paper-like appearance for improved eye comfort.

The TCL 40 NxtPaper and TCL 40 NxtPaper 5G are both being released globally later this year, first in Europe, before moving to other territories. TCL has not yet confirmed if the phone will receive a release in the US.

Both phones include a sensor that adjusts display brightness and color temperature in order to optimize how it looks based on environment and time of the day. When using the phones for reading, TCL says its NxtPaper UI can toggle between full color or a black-and-white mode when a reader wants a more book-like experience.

The non-5G model will ship with a 6.78-inch display, 256GB of storage, 8GB of RAM, dual speakers, a 32-megapixel front-facing camera and a triple-camera system that’s anchored by a 50-megapixel main camera. It will cost 199 euros when it’s released in Europe this September, which converts roughly to $215, 170 and AU$330.

The 5G model comes with a 6.6-inch display, 256GB of storage, 6GB of RAM, a 50-megapixel main rear camera and an 8-megapixel front-facing camera. This model will cost 249 euros and ship in October.

This screen technology has previously been released on TCL’s NxtPaper tablets and laptops. Back at CES 2023, TCL showed off a concept NxtPaper phone ahead of today’s official reveal.

The Oppo Find N3 Flip was officially unveiled on Tuesday. It’s a follow up to last year’s popular Find N2 Flip. Oppo released a series of images of the Find N3 Flip, which is bound for a global release following its launch in mainland China today.

One of the most obvious changes to the Find N3 Flip is the new circular camera bump, which reminds me of the one on the Huawei Pocket S released in late 2022. Oppo ditched the dual circle camera housing design in favor of a larger circular bump that can house more cameras.

The Find N3 Flip features a trio of Hasselblad-branded cameras on its cover: a 50-megapixel main, a 8-megapixel ultrawide and a 32-megapixel telephoto. That’s one more than found on the Find N2 Flip, the Motorola Razr Plus or the Galaxy Z Flip 5. In fact, the Find N3 Flip is probably the first clamshell-style foldable to feature three cameras on its exterior cover.

Read More: Samsung’s New Flip Phone Highlights the Clamshell’s Comeback

In its press release, Oppo bills the Find N3 Flip as the one that “rewrites the flip phone rulebook” and cuts back on compromises – but it excludes camera performance from that tradeoff. Flip phones have been known to have less-than-stellar camera performance compared to similarly-priced slab phones. This is due to the physical and engineering limitations of the flip phone design.

I have to give it up to Oppo for adding an extra camera and refreshing the design of the Find N3 Flip. But I hope that extra camera adds enough value to be worth the tradeoff for a visually more cluttered design and possible higher price. Oppo hadn’t shared pricing information at the time of this writing. For reference, last year’s Find N2 Flip was 849 which converts roughly to $1,070. Compare that with the Razr Plus and Galaxy Z Flip 5 which each start at 1,049, $1,000. Oppo won’t sell the Find N3 Flip in the US.

The Find N3 Flip has curved edges, compared to the boxer sides of the N2 Flip, and an alert slider, a hardware switch popularized by OnePlus (a subsidiary of Oppo) on its phones since it made it easy to toggle between ring, silent and vibrate modes. The N3 Flip also features a fresh color palette of black, light pink, and gold finishes.

“For Find N3 Flip, we’re bringing upgrades across the board – elevated styling, an improved cover screen experience, and a game-changing flip phone camera – simply put, expect the exquisite from Find N3 Flip,” Pete Lau, SVP and Chief Product Officer at Oppo said in a media release.

The Find N3 Flip has the same 6.8-inch 120Hz refresh rate display as the N2 Flip, but Oppo removed the screen’s polarizer which should make it easier to view with sunglasses and save a bit on battery life. Perhaps the biggest change however, comes to the cover screen’s software which can now run apps like YouTube, TikTok, Gmail, Reddit and Google Maps.

Oppo hasn’t been shy about its commitment to foldable phones. The Chinese company made a series of high profile sports partnerships including one with Wimbledon, the oldest tennis tournament in the world, to promote its Find N2 Flip. That marketing push is expected to continue this year. Foldable phones currently represent a small sliver of the broader smartphone market, but that piece of the pie is growing. According to the IDC, global foldable phone shipments will hit 21.4 million in 2023, which is up by more than 50% compared to 2022. By 2027, IDC projects that number to balloon to 48.1 million.

Oppo unveiled its inaugural flip phone, the Find N2 Flip in December last year, which was followed by a broader international launch in February this year. With the Find N2 Flip, Oppo shook up the design of flip phones by debuting a 3.26-inch vertical cover screen. At the time, the Find N2 Flip’s outer screen was one of the largest you could find on a foldable flip phone.

PC shipments have still yet to match the record numbers from 2020 and 2021 amid the COVID pandemic as many people bought new devices for working from home. And in 2023, shipments are forecast to drop again by 13.7% year over year to 252 million PCs, according to the latest International Data Corporation tracking numbers published Monday.

But the steady decline recorded since the pandemic could be coming to an end — shipments are predicted to grow to 261.4 million PCs next year, IDC says.

Part of the continued decline is due to PCs competing now with smaller smart devices like phones, tablets and gaming consoles.

“Consumer demand remains tepid at best as the segment continues to face economic headwinds,” Jitesh Ubrani, research manager for IDC Mobility and Consumer Device Trackers, said in a statement.

Artificial intelligence is also affecting PC purchasing decisions within businesses, including whether to postpone buying new computers until they’re better equipped for AI tasks, IDC says.

“The introduction of generative AI has all IT decision makers questioning where to prioritize budgets,” IDC said. “While AI-capable PCs are not ready today, they are coming.”

If you’re looking for a new PC, here are the best budget laptops for 2023, the best 15-inch laptops for work and gaming and the best laptops for college.

OpenAI is pushing further into the workplace. The company on Monday unveiled ChatGPT Enterprise, a new corporate version of its generative AI chatbot designed to be used by large companies. This version of ChatGPT is the next step toward building an all-encompassing “AI assistant for work,” the company said, adding that it believes AI can “elevate every aspect of our working lives.”

OpenAI said ChatGPT Enterprise, which is now available, will offer enhanced security, advanced data analysis functions, new abilities to input longer prompts and include a range of customization options. It will give businesses access to GPT-4, the latest version of the company’s AI technology. With the enterprise edition, OpenAI will also eliminate usage caps and promises performance up to twice as fast as previous versions.

OpenAI said that ChatGPT has already been used in 80% of Fortune 500 companies, and the company is promising new privacy safeguards. OpenAI said that ChatGPT Enterprise will not be trained on a company’s conversations, data or usage. Companies who have already tested the new corporate ChatGPT include Estée Lauder, graphic design software company Canva, content management platform Asana and the payment app Klarna.

OpenAI also offers a free version of ChatGPT for consumers, as well as a $20-a-month subscription option. There are also paid options for API access that let developers build ChatGPT into their own apps and services. An OpenAI spokesperson said pricing for ChatGPT Enterprise will vary depending on each company’s use case.

Since OpenAI’s initial release of ChatGPT late last year, generative AI has disrupted the workplace, education, fitness and more, leading to questions about its usefulness and impact on society. Nearly every major tech company has developed or implemented its own AI-powered features and chatbots. Both Microsoft’s Bing and Google’s Search have been implementing generative AI in their search experiences, while Amazon uses AI in its cloud service, and Meta has experimented with chatbots and language translation services.

In the workplace specifically, AI has been met with mixed reactions. According to predictions in a March report from Goldman Sachs, generative AI could potentially replace 7% of “current US employment” and complement 63%, while 30% could be unaffected by AI automation. However, many US workers are more hopeful than concerned about the impact of AI on their jobs, according to a recent Pew survey, even in jobs where key activities could be replaced by the technology.

In hiring, software has long been used for recruiting and screening applicants, though rapid adoption of ChatGPT and other AI tools for hiring has raised concerns. Earlier this year, CNET’s Laura Michelle Davis reported that it’s now common for job seekers to be “rejected by a robot before they’re connected with an actual human in human resources.”

Editors’ note: CNET is using an AI engine to help create some stories. For more, see this post.

If you wear a smartwatch or fitness tracker daily, do you regularly sanitize the band? If not, this will convince you: a scientific study published in May examined 20 different smart wristbands and found 95% were contaminated with harmful bacteria that can cause infections.

The paper detailed how researchers tested smartwatch and fitness tracker bands worn by 20 random, anonymous people. The bands were rubber, plastic, cloth, metal and leather. As the paper pointed out, we wear our watches and fitness trackers while working out, swimming, holding pets, eating, using the bathroom, showering and sleeping, and yet we do not often sanitize them.

Of the 20 watch bands, researchers found that 85% had Staphylococcus aureus (Staph aureus), 60% had Escherichia coli (E. coli) and 30% had Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa) bacteria present. Rubber and plastic bands had the highest rates of harmful bacteria on them, while metallic gold and silver bands had the lowest, as published earlier by 9to5Mac.

The researchers concluded that “wristbands, often worn daily without routine cleaning, may accumulate potentially pathogenic bacteria.” They labeled the issue as being “of public health significance,” adding that infections could be avoided if we sanitized our watch bands more often (or at all).

Luckily for us, they also researched how to clean the bacteria off.

How to sanitize your smartwatch band

Here’s how to clean your germ-ridden fitness tracker and smartwatch wristbands:

1. Take your watch off your wrist.
2. Grab either Lysol Disinfectant Spray or a 70% Ethanol cleaner, like those little alcohol wipes. The researchers also tested apple cider vinegar, but found it was not effective on Staph aureus, even after 5 minutes of cleaning.
3. Wipe your watch band. Then keep wiping. Lysol and 70% alcohol killed 99.99% of E. coli, Staph aureus and P. aeruginosa after 30 seconds of contact.
4. If you’ve got a plastic wristband, keep wiping for 2 minutes. The researchers found that 30 seconds of exposure to Lysol or 70% Ethanol wasn’t enough to kill harmful bacteria on plastic bands.

How often do you need to do this? The paper didn’t specify, beyond saying it should be “regular.”

Or you could just switch to a metal band, in particular one made of gold. And do not wear a plastic one if you’re germ conscious.

You’ll need more than advanced hardware to build a decent PC. The operating system is one of the most important components, and if you want to run Windows on your freshly-assembled desktop, then we’ve got a deal you won’t want to miss. Windows 11 Pro is Microsoft’s latest and greatest OS, and while it typically costs $200, you can pick it up for just $33 right now at StackSocial. However, this deal is only available through Aug. 31, so be sure to get your order in before then if you don’t want to miss out on these savings.

This is, of course, a great price, but it’s important to note that not every computer out there is able to run Windows 11, so before you buy it, you’re going to want to ensure that your computer will meet the requirements that are required. Additionally, the listing says that if you have a PC that’s already running Windows 10 and Windows Update doesn’t let you install the free Windows 11 upgrade, your computer will not be compatible with this version either.

The activation key that is provided following your purchase can be used to install and activate Windows 11 Pro on three computers. To be clear, purchases like this are generally intended for advanced users — those who are building a new computer or who want to dual-boot an existing computer with a second OS. To that end, you will need a secondary PC to access and download the files following your purchase, so be sure you can access everything from another computer in your home, or you have a friend’s machine that you can use temporarily. (You’ll also want to have a USB thumb drive on hand to transfer the file.) Microsoft provides three ways to access Windows 11 Pro following your purchase, so you can pick the one that will work best for your situation.

Labor Day, which falls on Sept. 4 this year, is just around the corner, but the savings are already starting to roll in. Tons of brands and retailers have kicked off their end-of-summer sales a little early this year, and you can already shop tons of great bargains on mattresses, furniture, tech and more. Best Buy is one such retailer, and is currently offering plenty of early holiday savings on kitchen appliances, laptops, beauty products and much, much more.

To help you make the most of these early Labor Day savings, we’ve rounded up some of the best bargains available at Best Buy below. And the tech retailer will be adding another wave of deals on Friday, Sept. 1, so be sure to check back this weekend for even more offers you won’t want to miss.

More early Labor Day deals at Best Buy:

• Bose QuietComfort 45 headphones: $279 (save $50)
• Ring Indoor Cam (2nd gen): $35 (save $25)
• Ring Video Doorbell Pro 2: $175 (save $75)
• Google AC1200 mesh router: $70 (save $30)
• Instant Pot Solo single-serve coffee maker: $60 (save $40)
• Shokz OpenRun Pro: $140 (save $40)
• Philips Norelco Shaver 5000X: $60 (save $20)

• Soap On A Rope Tactical Scrubber: $16 (save $10)

• Dyson Supersonic Origin: $300 (save $100)
• Sennheiser Momentum 3 earbuds: $180 (save $100)

Booking a flight can be frustrating. Airfares vary wildly, and even if you know well in advance where you’re going, there’s no clear consensus as to when you should finally commit and buy that ticket. But on Monday, Google Flights released a new feature that offers updated insights on when to finally pull the trigger on tickets.

Google Flights already showed whether current prices for your flight search are low, typical or high compared to past averages for the same route. And now you can also see when prices have typically been lowest to your chosen dates and destination.

It works for searches that have reliable trend data.

“These insights could tell you that the cheapest time to book similar trips is usually two months before departure, and you’re currently in that sweet spot,” the Google blog post notes. “Or you might learn that prices have usually dropped closer to takeoff, so you decide to wait before booking. Either way, you can make that decision with a greater sense of confidence.”

Price tracking can help

If it’s not a good time to book, you can turn on price tracking on Google Flights to receive automatic notifications for when flight prices drop significantly. This can be set up for specific dates, or if you’ve got flexible plans, you can turn on “any dates” to receive emails about deals anytime in the next three to six months.

Get a price guarantee

You can now watch for a colorful price guarantee badge on certain flight results on Google Flights. According to the blog, this means the site is confident that the fare will not drop. If you book and it does end up dropping, Google will even pay you the difference.

“When you book one of these flights, we’ll monitor the price every day before takeoff, and if the price does go down, we’ll pay you back the difference via Google Pay,” the blog post notes. “These price guarantees are part of a pilot program available for select Book on Google itineraries departing from the US.”

General booking tips

If you’re not planning a specific trip now, you may still want to take note of these specific travel-booking trips. The blog post notes that the best time to book flights for the holiday season is in early October. That’s a big change from the site’s 2022 statistics, which found that average prices for mid-December trips were lowest just 22 days before departure.

And if you’re thinking of trip from the US to Europe, the site notes that those average prices have been lowest 72 days or more before departure. Once you’re about 10 weeks from a planned European departure, average airfares from the US to Europe tend to increase over time, the post says.