Audio/Video

Netatmo on Monday announced a smart security camera and floodlight combo at CES 2016. The Presence camera is designed for outdoor use and can identify objects such as people, animals and vehicles. The camera, which connects to a rectangular floodlight, can be customized to send alerts to a smartphon...

A room-sensing camera planted on the front of the Vive Pre was the reason the release of Valve and HTC's virtual reality headset was delayed, the companies revealed Tuesday at CES 2016. The Vive VR headset was supposed to beat Oculus VR and Sony to the punch, coming out in the last quarter of last y...

GADGET DREAMS AND NIGHTMARES

Gadget Ogling: A Smart Home Hub, a Tiny Drone, and a Whispering Camera

LG's SmartThinq Hub seeks to bring together all of your connected appliances and smart sensors under one roof. As extras, it sprinkles on top music streaming, through radio stations or whatever you happen to play on your smartphone -- and reminders, through its 3.5-inch display. The hub can monito...

Chances are, you know an Apple fanatic -- someone whose iPhone, Mac or iPad is a prized possession. If you don't know a true fanatic, you probably know a fan -- or barring that, someone who might appreciate an Apple-made gift this holiday season. To help you cut through the chaff, from one Apple f...

Facebook last week launched a beta of its Live Video service for a small percentage of iPhone users in the United States. Live Video reportedly will be available for the Android platform at a later date. Facebook also has launched a pilot to make it easier to share videos from mobile devices. Some i...

Nokia this week revealed its Ozo virtual reality camera system. Priced at $60,000, it will ship in the first quarter of 2016. Nokia is clearly targeting a market a tier or two higher than the segment YouTube and GoPro have set their sights on with the Jump VR platform, which is about a fourth of Ozo...

Apple intends to peel the 3.5-millimeter headphone jack from the next version of the iPhone, according to a new rumor. Dumping the jack reportedly would allow Apple to shave a millimeter off the thickness of the unit. Without it, headphones would have to be connected to the phone through Bluetooth o...

One of the current issues with 3D printing is that it can take some time to create physical versions of large or complex designs. Nexa3D's NX1 prints objects as much as 100 times faster than competitors, with printing speeds of about a centimeter in height every minute. It uses light on a certain ty...

Microsoft on Thursday began rolling out the New Xbox One Experience, delivering backward compatibility for Xbox 360 games and updating the user interface to a Windows 10 foundation. Support for legacy Xbox games is the headliner, but the roughly 1.15-GB update includes new social elements baked into...

GADGET DREAMS AND NIGHTMARES

Gadget Ogling: Comfy Earbuds, Barking Bots, and USB Killers

If you're a human being who listens to music using earbuds, chances are you've run into some issues along the way in keeping the infernal things nestled into your ear canal. Manufacturers have tried to find solutions, such as offering different-sized rubber molds, but we're still hewing to a few-siz...

Lytro last week announced its Immerge concept, a virtual reality camera system that promises to plop people right in the center of an experience the company calls "six degrees of freedom." Lytro's Immerge harnesses the potential of light field technology, the same tech behind the clandestine Magic L...

To communicate online in 2015 is to have at least a passing awareness of emoji -- the colorful symbols that are endemic in social media and text messages. Inputting emoji into a post or message from a computer is often awkward, though this item might help. EmojiWorks has a physical keyboard which,...

Facebook on Thursday announced Music Stories, a feature in its iPhone app that lets users post links to music they like with comments. Clicking the link will launch a 30-second preview of the music, which is streamed from either Apple Music or Spotify. Listeners then can purchase the music from the ...

Instagram last week began offering packaged videos tied to topical events, starting with a stream of video content to celebrate Halloween. In launching a curated content initiative, Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, is following in the steps of Snapchat and Twitter. Snapchat launched Live Stori...

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