Notebooks, Tablets, Smartphones, Wearables And Gadgets
In-depth product reviews and news of notebooks, tablets, smartphones, wearable technologies and gadgets. We're now living in a contextually-aware computing world and mobile devices can not only help us enjoy the ride but create and capture new experiences as well.
The 2019 Mobile World Congress kicks off tomorrow in Barcelona, Spain but several companies have already introduced a wide variety of products. Many consumers are eagerly awaiting the announcement of mobile devices like foldable or 5G smartphones. However, after several months of heavy-handed hints, we have finally seen what Microsoft plans to do with their offering in mixed reality technology. The Redmond company just unveiled their HoloLens 2 at its press event today. The HoloLens 2 builds upon the original HoloLens, a mixed reality headset that was released by Microsoft in 2016. According to Julia White, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft Azure, the HoloLens assisted...
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Motorola is currently on its third-generation of Moto Z smartphones and the 2018 flagship is the new Moto Z3. The Moto Z3 still supports the growing family of Moto Mod accessories, and early next year it will be available with the 5G Moto Mod, making it one of the first smartphones on the market with 5G capabilities. Whereas Motorola's previous generation Moto Z2 Force was priced at $720 unlocked, direct from Motorola when it launched last year, the Moto Z3 debuts at a much more palatable $480 as a Verizon Wireless exclusive. You can also pay for the device using a Verizon installment plan for $20/month for 24 months. In addition, if you're a new customer switching...
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The original Motorola Z Play made a name for itself among users who champion smartphone battery life above all other features. It was not uncommon to hear of Moto Z Play users getting multiple days of power out of a single charge. In our review, Its battery life trounced every other phone we have ever tested by a wide margin. So, when the Moto Z2 Play was introduced last year, many lamented Motorola’s decision to slim the phone down and ultimately reduce battery capacity. While battery life was still exceptional, it fell far from eclipsing its processor. It is no surprise then that demands were high for the new Moto Z3 Play’s battery life to improve over the Z2 Play’s minor...
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Back in late June, we were alerted to a new product announcement on tap for August 2nd from Motorola. Luckily for us, we're here live in Chicago at Motorola HQ today to see what the company has in store for consumers, and it's quite interesting. The company launched the all-new Moto Z3, which serves as the follow-up to last year's Moto Z2. It has a 6-inch Full HD+ OLED display with an 18:9 aspect ratio that takes up most of the front of the device. There are still notable bezels on the bottom and top, but it at least doesn't mar your viewing experience with a notch (if you’re not into those newfangled notched flagships). However, we do have a bit of mixed news on the processing front....
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When Microsoft released the original Surface Pro five years ago, the mobile market was completely different – Windows tablets were an afterthought and weren’t the svelte and snappy performers you can buy today. The first-generation Surface Pro wasn’t perfect, but it was a huge step in the right direction for Windows 2-in-1’s and tablets. Today’s mobile computing device landscape is completely different versus five years ago and one could argue it was significantly re-shaped by the success of the Surface Pro. Each notebook manufacturer has its own interpretation of mobile nirvana. Whether it’s the HP Envy, Dell XPS, Lenovo Yoga or ASUS Zenbook, there are plenty...
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Microsoft just announced a few brand new products: a pair of powerful new Surface Book 2 devices featuring 8th Gen Intel Core Processors and NVIDIA graphics, and a Surface Precision Mouse designed to be the perfect companion to the devices. The new Surface Book 2 borrows virtually all of the physical design cues of the original, but this latest iteration features more powerful hardware, better battery life, enhanced display technology, and a myriad of other refinements that improve upon the first Surface Book. We have a quick hands-on video to share if you’d like a visual tour before we dig in – as you’ll see, from the outside, the Surface Book 2 (especially the 13.5” model featured in the video)...
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A funny thing happened as we were evaluating the latest iteration of Microsoft's Surface Pro, a now iconic 2-in-1 that the company describes as "the most versatile laptop," despite its tablet-first design. A rumor emerged suggesting Microsoft would phase out its Surface line within the next couple of years. It was really more of a prediction than a rumor. During the EMEA Canalys Channels Forum in Venice, Canalys CEO Steve Brazier pointed to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella being a software guy who is more interested in the cloud than hardware. Lenovo COO Gianfranco Lanci backed his assessment during a subsequent Q&A session, saying Microsoft might even abandon its Surface business a bit earlier....
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Lenovo introduced their Moto Z family last year with high hopes of being something different. The evolution of smartphone design has been more iterative than innovate in recent years from most manufacturers. The Moto Z smartphones, however, offered modularity to allow the phones to adapt to a user’s in-the-moment needs. The Moto Mods concept is an intriguing one, but was ultimately met with mixed reviews. It is certainly the best execution we have seen to date with a growing selection of mods and simple plug-and-play operation, but many users are put off by needing to keep the phone-sized mods around. There has also been a fair question of if Lenovo would stick with the platform, as LG...
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Last year’s release of the Moto Z family of phones introduced the world to Mods – magnetic accessory attachments that added features to the phones, like higher-quality speakers, a portable projector, or optical zoom camera. However, the US release of the Moto Z was limited to Verizon and unlocked customers only. This year Motorola is back with the new Z2 Force, packing support for the same Mods, but launching on AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon. While the latest Moto Z2 Force has all the makings of a flagship smartphone with its Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor, Super AMOLED display, and dual rear camera setup, it’s up against some fierce competition from the likes of Samsung, LG, HTC,...
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Moto introduced the Moto Z family back in July with the launch of the Moto Z and Moto Z Force. Packed with flagship worthy hardware like the Qualcomm Snapdragon 820, both phones made a serious statement (click for full review) thanks to their modular capabilities, by way of Moto Mods. Moto Mods tune the already premium smartphones to a whole new level when attached. We were impressed by the Moto Mods we played with, including JBL's SoundBoost and the Moto Insta-Share Projector. Unfortunately, these phones were tied to Verizon at the time of our review, but unlocked variants are now trickling onto store shelves. Today, however, we take a close look at the newest sibling in the Moto Z family...
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Although most of us would prefer to own all of the latest and greatest smartphones, there are plenty of us who don’t need all of the power and features today’s top phones have to offer. In addition, the high price tags on today's flagship phones presents a barrier for many. For casual smartphone users, there isn’t enough to gain by spending many hundreds of dollars more on a high end phone versus a more modest (and budget-friendly) model. It is for these reasons that Moto created the Moto G4 Play. As the third member of the new Moto G family, the Moto G4 Play is designed for fundamental smartphone functionality -- staying in touch with family and friends, catching up on the news, playing games,...
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A good rule of thumb when purchasing a gaming laptop is to buy one with the fastest GPU you can afford. Unlike desktop PCs, you usually can't rip out the graphics adapter and upgrade to something faster (not in most cases, anyway), so when that once shiny and fast laptop starts feeling a little sluggish, you're looking at dialing down in-game settings until you've saved enough scratch to buy a new laptop. That's an expensive proposition (it's called throwing the baby out with the bath water), but if gaming on the go is what you're after, you don't have much choice in the matter.That's still the situation today, though one thing working to your advantage is NVIDIA's Pascal architecture. Pascal...
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Motorola recently launched two new flagship Droid offerings, the Moto Z and Moto Z Force. We really liked them for their ultra-premium design, strong performance, and innovative Moto Mods add-on features. However, Moto is also ushering in a refresh of their more mainstream, cost-effective Moto G family as well. We last looked at the Moto G in 2014. We weren't blown away by performance, however, we were impressed how much the device managed to offer for just $149. The Moto G delivered Android’s core experience with good enough web browsing and general productivity performance to stand above other budget smartphones at the time. For once, “budget” did not mean a laggy experience...
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Last month, the partnership between Motorola and Lenovo seemed to crystalize when the combined company stepped out with its first co-branded smartphone products that will ship here in the United States. Lenovo acquired Motorola's Mobility division from Google a couple of years back, but has rightfully lead with the iconic Moto brand for new smartphone (and smartwatch) product introductions since the acquisition. It wasn't until we saw Lenovo's Product Engineer/Spokesman, Ashton Kutcher take the stage last month at Lenovo Tech World to launch the new Moto Z and Moto Z Force, that it became apparent the assimilation of Moto within Lenovo was complete. The Lenovo-Motorola Moto Z Droid, Moto...
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