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Wemo’s new Video Doorbell works exclusively with Apple’s HomeKit

Belkin-owned home automation brand Wemo has unveiled a new generation of smart home products, including a new Smart Video Doorbell with a 178-degree field of view and a 4-megapixel camera.

Built for Apple’s HomeKit Secure Video, the doorbell can easily be managed via the Home app on an iPhone, iPad or Mac, while the feed is analyzed directly from the user’s HomePod mini, Apple TV or iPad, eliminating the need for you to use the Wemo app. This change makes it easier to set up, update, and operate smart home devices on the Homekit network.

The doorbell’s video feed is end-to-end encrypted, and up to 10 days of motion-based footage can be stored on your iCloud. The doorbell can detect familiar people if they are tagged or recognized in the Photos or Home app and notify you accordingly directly on your mobile device.

Further, according to Wemo, the Doorbell features “enhanced” night vision and a feed that will remain clear even when zoomed in, allowing you to monitor any activity outside your door at odd hours.

It’s worth noting that you’ll need a pre-existing wired doorbell system to be able to set up Wemo’s Smart Video Doorbell.

Wemo’s Smart Video Doorbell is available to order directly from Belkin’s website starting today for a price of $249.99 USD (roughly $317 CAD).

Wemo is also revamping some of its existing products, including the Wemo Smart Plug, Smart Light Switch, and the Smart Dimmer to communicate via Matter over Thread. Adding support for Matter will allow Wemo’s products to communicate with other smart home accessories, regardless of their manufacturer, along with more security, faster response time and better connectivity.

Wemo says its new suite of smart plugs and accessories will be released in 25 countries sometime later this year.

In other Belkin-related news, the company’s Soundform Immerse Noise Cancelling Earbuds and Magnetic Phone Mount have been awarded the CES Innovation Award Honoree.

Image credit: Belkin

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Mobile Syrup

Sony’s next VR headset is officially called the PSVR 2

During its CES 2022 keynote, Sony finally shared more details regarding its next virtual reality headset, confirming that it’s called the PSVR 2 (PlayStation VR 2).

Though the tech giant didn’t show off what the next-gen headset will look like, it did reveal a lot of new information about the device, including the name of its gamepads, the ‘Sense Controllers.’ The PSVR 2’s new gamepads will feature the same haptic trigger feedback functionality as the PlayStation 5’s DualSense gamepad.

Sony also detailed that the headset features an OLED display with a 2000 x 2040 pixel resolution per eye, a 90Hz to 120Hz refresh rate and a field-of-view of roughly 110 degrees. Other features include four cameras built into the headset and an eye-tracking IR camera.

“Your movements and the direction you look at are reflected in-game without the need for an external camera,” said Sony in a recent blog post.

Along with outlining several facts about the PSVR 2, Sony also confirmed that Guerilla Games and Freesprite Games are working on a title for the headset called Horizon Call of the Mountain. No additional information was revealed about the upcoming title.

It’s unclear when Sony plans to release the PSVR 2 but rumours point to it releasing at some point in 2022.

Source: Sony 

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Mobile Syrup

Anker’s Nebula to launch new projector called Cosmos Laser 4K with Android TV

Anker’s sub-brand Nebula is launching a new projector called Cosmos Laser 4K.

The new projector runs Android TV 10.0, sports a pair of 30W speakers for games/movies and can project 4K images at 2400 ANSI lumens.

Like other Android TV 10.0 projectors, the device won’t be able to run Netflix natively, but Anker says that the Cosmos Laser comes with a 4K streaming dongle, allowing users to cast content from their smartphones.

Additional features include three-second autofocus, automatic keystone correction and eye-guard technology, which will protect kids or pets that might attempt to look directly into the bright bulb.

Anker will launch a Kickstarter on January 11th before shipping the Cosmos Laser 4K in March. The device will cost $2,199 USD ( about $2,796 CAD), which is expensive. In comparison, BenQ’s 4K Gaming Projector costs $1,850 CAD.

Source: Nebula Via: The Verge

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Mobile Syrup

Here’s an explainer on Wordle from someone who just learned what it was

Over the past few weeks, you might have seen people you follow on Twitter randomly posting about something called “Wordle.” The game has apparently blown up over the holidays, but if you’re like me, you also might not have had any idea of what it was.

With that in mind, let’s stumble our way through it together. To put it simply, Wordle is a free word-based puzzle game that you can play in your browser for free — no download required. That certainly makes it easier to access, although actually playing it can likely be somewhat challenging.

Basically, Wordle gives players six chances to guess a random five-letter word. Letters will be highlighted in three different colours to denote the following:

  • Green — the correct letter in the correct spot
  • Yellow — a correct letter in the wrong spot
  • Grey — a letter that doesn’t show up anywhere in the word

One of the unique elements about Wordle is that it’s the same puzzle for everyone each day. This adds a social element to it, as people can discuss how they got on with the daily puzzle. To that point, you can even share a solution-free summary of your results to show how you fared.

It’ll show up like so:

Notably, U.K. Redditor Josh Wardle told The New York Times that he originally created the game for his partner before making it available online for everyone. He also says he’s already queued up the game with around 2,500 words, so it’ll be good to go for quite some time. Despite that, he promises that he has no intentions of monetizing the game.

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Mobile Syrup

Ford almost doubling F-150 Lighting production, still won’t meet demand

Ford can’t keep up with the demand for the upcoming Lightning electric F-150 truck, and it just doubled its production goals for 2022.

The legacy automaker has increased the Lightning Truck’s output to 150,000 per year to help meet the demand of its 200,000 reservation holders. The company’s press release says that it will start offering reservation holders the opportunity to buy the truck over the next few months. Roughly 50,000 pre-order holders will need to turn down the opportunity to buy the truck or there won’t be enough available at launch.

Ford is hoping to build out its EV production capacity over the next two years to build over 600,000 EVs per year by 2025. While the Lighting production is just beginning, Ford is also hoping to bump up the Mach-E output to 200,000 cars by 2023.

Source: Ford

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Mobile Syrup

Dell insists the touch bar on its new XPS 13 isn’t a touch bar

Dell unveiled the newest version of its popular XPS 13 laptop at CES 2022 with a few striking changes.

There’s a touch bar “capacitive touch function row” along the top edge of the keyboard and underneath it is a “haptic ForcePad” that goes from one end to the other.

At first glance, the new XPS 13 is striking and, in my opinion, it looks fantastic. But I can’t help worrying that some of the changes Dell made to the laptop might not be that great. Unfortunately, I haven’t had a chance to try one yet, so I’m mostly judging from photos and details shared in hands-on pieces from various U.S. publications that did get to try out the XPS 13.

Let’s start with that function row. Dell insists it isn’t a touch bar, but as The Verge aptly points out, it’s a bar of things you can touch — ergo, touch bar.

Semantics aside, the new XPS 13’s touch bar isn’t a touch bar in the sense of Apple’s much-maligned MacBook Pro series. Dell’s take on the touch bar is to basically replace each physical function key with a capacitive touch button. That means you still have, for example, a dedicated escape key. It’s just not a physical button anymore.

I’ll withhold judgement until I can spend some hands-on time with the new XPS 13, but I am concerned about accidental button presses with this new touch bar.

Working our way down, we come to the keyboard, which boasts big, square keys with a minuscule gap between them. It looks nice, but I’m concerned about how practical the keyboard would be for typing and early comments from The Verge’s hands-on reinforce those concerns. The keys still have the same 1mm travel as last year’s XPS 13, but there’s more to a good keyboard than key travel.

Finally, the touchpad. On the surface, it looks like Dell did a good thing, but according to CNET’s hands-on, the actual touch area of the touchpad doesn’t extend all the way across the laptop. Instead, it stretches from the outside edge of one Alt key to the other. While that’s still quite a large touchpad offering, the lack of indicators where the touchpad ends and the palm rest begins will likely prove confusing for some users.

Functionally, the touchpad sounds more like Apple’s MacBook trackpad. It doesn’t actually ‘press’ when you click it — instead, it mimics the feeling of clicking with haptics.

Again, it’s too early to say one way or another whether the changes Dell made to the XPS 13 are good, bad or otherwise. There are reasons to be concerned, sure, but I’d wait for reviews first. Dell says the XPS 13 will start shipping worldwide in the spring and the expected starting price is $1,199 USD (about $1,523 CAD).

You can check out more news from CES 2022 here.

Images credit: Dell

Source: The Verge, CNET

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Mobile Syrup

Targus reveals backpack with Apple’s ‘Find My’ tracking built-in

Targus’ new Cypress Hero EcoSmart Backpack may look like a standard backpack, but there’s a twist.

The backpack features Apple’s ‘Find My’ technology built directly into it. This means that the device is able to leverage Apple’s network of billions of devices through Find My, allowing users to track its location directly through their iPhone or iPad.

On the other side of the spectrum, the backpack can also be used to track a lost iPhone thanks to a built-in button located inside the bag. Similar to the other backpacks in its EcoSmart line, Targus says that the Cypress Hero is made of roughly 26 recycled water bottles

To power its AirTag-like Find My tech, the Cypress Hero features a built-in battery that can be recharged via USB. It’s unclear how much the backpack will cost in Canada, but in the U.S. it’s priced at $149 USD (about $189 CAD). The Cypress Hero doesn’t currently have a specific release date but should drop in the spring/summer of 2022.

Alongside its new Find My compatible backpack, Targus also revealed a new USB-C Hybrid/Universal 4K Quad Dock and a UV-C LED Disinfection Light.

Image credit: Targus 

Source: Newswire 

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Mobile Syrup

TCL reveals a range of new products at CES

TCL unveiled a bunch of new tech at its virtual CES 2022 press conference, including new mini LED TVs, smartphones, tablets, laptops, and more, along with announcing the company’s new brand slogan — “Inspire Greatness.”

TCL’s new TV lineup will now adopt a faster 144Hz refresh rate for smoother and more responsive gameplay along with mini LED technology for better control over display brightness, deeper blacks, a higher contrast ratio and better power efficiency.

“TCL is aiming to become the top player in the Mini LED TV sector in the coming years with higher production standards, higher energy efficiency and premium image performance,” reads the company’s release about the new TVs.

The company says more information about the new TVs will come out later in Q1, 2022.

Apart from new TVs, TCL is also releasing new TCL 30 XE 5G and 30 V 5G handsets exclusively in the United States, with the former sporting a 6.5-inch 90Hz display and the latter featuring a 6.67-inch 90Hz display.

In addition,  TCL will soon release six new tablets with three of them designed specifically for children. TCL calls these kid-centric tablets its TKEE series, and it will feature a Mini, Mid and Max version of the device.  The other three are namely the TCL NXTPAPER 10s that the company says has a paper-like eye-friendly display, the TCL Tab 8 4G which is a lightweight tablet ideal for students and the TCL Tab 10L, a tablet designed with ‘entertainment’ at its core.

Adding to the lineup is TCL’s first-ever laptop. The sleek and lightweight 14-inch TCL Book 14 Go has a solid 12-hour battery life along with 4G LTE support and will be powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 7C processor, which we usually see in Chromebooks.

Learn more about TCL’s upcoming product releases here.

You can check out more news from CES 2022 here.

Image credit: TCL

Source: TCL

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Mobile Syrup

Facebook’s 10-inch Portal Smart display is $130 off at Amazon

Facebook’s Portal smart video calling display is currently discounted on Amazon Canada’s website.

Below are all of the Facebook Portal deals:

Facebook’s Portal smart video calling displays allow users to easily video call with friends and family using Messenger and WhatsApp, even if they don’t have a portal.

The devices also feature Alexa built-in, which will let you control your smart home, listen to music, watch the news and more.

The products are on sale for a limited time.

Check out the sale, here.

MobileSyrup utilizes affiliate partnerships. These partnerships do not influence our editorial content, though MobileSyrup may earn a commission on purchases made via these links that helps fund the journalism provided free on our website.

Source: Amazon 

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Mobile Syrup

Intel says it started shipping first-gen Arc GPUs to manufacturers

Intel’s Arc GPUs are getting a little closer to reality. Alongside a wealth of CPU announcements at CES 2022, Intel took a little time to provide an update on its anticipated entry into the GPU field.

During its CES 2022 keynote, Intel revealed that it had started shipping its first-gen ‘Alchemist‘ GPUs to manufacturers of desktop and laptop systems, which include Acer, Asus, Clevo, Dell, Gigabyte, Haier, HP, Lenovo, Samsung, MSI and NEC.

The Arc GPUs will mark a significant shift for Intel as they make the company’s new Xe graphics architecture available in discrete laptop and desktop GPUs. Xe, and previous Intel graphics solutions, have typically been available as integrated options added to the company’s CPUs. While integrated graphics can be capable enough for most people, they often don’t stack up to dedicated, discrete GPUs in certain workloads or in gaming.

Intel talks a big game about Arc as well. The company said that Arc graphics will offer “industry-leading” features, such as hardware-accelerated ray tracing and Xe Super Sampling (XeSS), which Intel describes as an upscaling technology powered by artificial intelligence. Another benefit to Arc will be support for Intel’s ‘Deep Link‘ technology, which should provide performance and efficiency boosts by allowing Intel CPUs and GPUs to work together.

While it’s good to see Intel’s Arc plans moving forward, The Verge points out that we’re still missing a lot of information. Manufacturers may have their hands on Arc, but there’s no word on when they’ll release computers with Intel GPUs. Further, we don’t know if or when Intel will make discrete Arc GPUs available for people to buy and integrate into their own custom-built rigs. Intel also hasn’t shared any details about specifications or cost.

That being said, Intel also shared at CES 2022 that it will require discrete Arc GPUs as part of its Evo certification program for laptops using Intel 12th Gen Core H-Series chips. With Evo laptops expected to start shipping in the first half of 2022, we may get to see Intel Arc out in the world sooner rather than later.

You can read more about Intel at CES 2022 here, or check out more news from CES 2022 here.

Source: Intel Via: The Verge