In 2011, Motorola, Inc. split into Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions. Google acquired Motorola Mobility in 2012 ​and sold it to Lenovo in 2014. The Z series smartphones are nearly stock Android with a bit of Moto customization thrown in. They compete well with flagship phones from Google and Samsung. Here’s a look at Motorola’s recent Z phone releases. Now, with an integrated fingerprint sensor on the display glass, the phone has never been more secure....

The just-announced next-generation Apple TV 4K is packed with nifty features, thanks to the inclusion of the company’s A15 Bionic chipset. This chip boosts CPU performance by 50 percent over the previous model, making for snappier navigation, quicker UI animations, greater responsiveness, and more. The GPU has also been boosted, and Apple says the new chip is 30 percent faster when gaming on the device or when using it to access various cloud-gaming platforms....

Some new underwater vehicles, like the Mare-IT project, are designed for industrial purposes like inspecting drilling rigs or wind turbines. The project’s two-armed underwater robot is used for complex inspection and maintenance tasks. But researchers say the more urgent need is for scientific exploration. “We need to measure the amount of heat the ocean and atmosphere is absorbing each year,” Hugh Roarty, an ocean engineer at Rutgers University and IEEE Member, told Lifewire in an email interview....

The update release looks to squash 37 important bugs, as well as seven critical issues seen in Windows, .NET Core & Visual Studio, Azure, Microsoft Graphics Component, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Scripting Engine, Remote Desktop, Microsoft Windows Codecs Library, and more. The Hacker News also reports that Microsoft released an update for Microsoft Edge, which addressed seven additional security flaws found in the browser in early August. One of the biggest flaws addressed with the update, CVE-2021-36948 is an elevated privilege flaw that directly affects Microsoft’s Windows Update Medic Service, which helps to protect and remediate Windows Update components....

Contrary to the name, this is not a stick you slide into your ear canal. Instead, the Ear Stick is just a pair of earbuds, albeit with some interesting and unique specifications. Nothing’s newest creation boasts a comfortable half-in-ear design and an extremely light form factor, 4.4 grams each, to allow for longer use sessions. Nothing says the 12.6mm dynamic audio driver included with the Ear Stick is “one of the most sensitive in the market” and excels with “clear highs and bold details....

This is the final, WHQL version of these drivers and replaces all previously available drivers. You should install v527.56 if you have a supported NVIDIA GPU running any previous driver release. See How Do I Find a Driver’s Version Number? if you’re not sure which NVIDIA GeForce driver version you have installed. Changes in NVIDIA GeForce v527.56 Here are details on the new features, fixes, and other changes in v527....

How to View Pictures You’ve Downloaded From the Web Every file type is associated with a specific program on your computer, so double clicking an image file will open it in your computer’s default image viewer. If a file type is not supported, then you will be asked to choose a program to open it with. Microsoft Photos and Preview for Mac support all image formats including GIF and JPEG images, so if they cannot open the file, then you need another type program....

Upon downloading the 2022.2 update, you’ll see stronger visual indicators for playlists and recently played podcasts on the home page. The new features include a Mark as Played option for episodes and customizable color options for the app’s themes. You can customize each of the front page playlists by changing its color and icon with over 3,000 SF Symbols to choose from. These symbols meld perfectly with the San Francisco font, the standard font used on all of Apple’s platforms....

What Is DTS:X and MDA? DTS:X has its roots with SRS Labs (now Xperi), which developed object-based surround sound technology under the umbrella name of MDA (Multi-Dimensional Audio). With MDA, sound objects are not tied to specific channels or speakers. Instead, sound objects are assigned to a position in three-dimensional space. MDA gives content creators an open-ended tool for mixing audio that can be applied to various end-user formats. Using DTS:X as the output format, sound mixers and engineers can place sounds individually regardless of channel assignment or speaker layout....

The Pixel Slate is Google’s latest foray into the world of tablet computers. It runs lightweight ChromeOS software that’s designed to make it easy to pick up and use in seconds, but can this tablet compete with stiff competition from tablets with more robust operating systems? Design: A slim smudge magnet The moment I took the Pixel Slate out of its packaging it acquired tiny scratches. Not only is the finish on the back of the device easily scratched, but it’s also a fingerprint magnet, as is the screen itself....

Use Siri With Your Headphones to Play Music As long as Siri is enabled, use your headphones to instruct your personal assistant to open the Music app and play music. Hold down the button on your headphones and wait for Siri to begin listening. Then say Play [song] to start playing a specific song. There are lots of other ways to play music and control playback with Siri using your headphones, including these voice controls:...

In an unsurprising move, Qualcomm continues to iterate on its Snapdragon chips to eke out more power and performance with each new model. We only just saw the release of the Snapdragon 8 earlier this year, and now the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 (along with the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1) is already on the way. The Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 offers what Qualcomm refers to as Snapdragon Elite Gaming features—increasing frame rates without extra power draw, faster rendering, and so on....

The Razer Blade Stealth 13 is, on paper, the laptop that I’ve been waiting for my whole life. I’m more of a desktop workstation type of person most of the time, because the majority of my work involves video editing, design, and motion graphics. And when I’m not using my computer for work, I’m probably using it for games. All this to say, it’s not really feasible for me to forego a desktop entirely in favor of a laptop, so my ideal laptop finds a happy medium between portability and performance....

On a computer, a space between words is not a blank area but a character, and these extra characters can affect how data is used in a worksheet — such as in the CONCATENATE function, which combines multiple cells of data into one. Rather than manually editing the data to remove the unwanted spaces, use the TRIM function to remove the extra spaces from between the words or other text strings....

The update was discovered by the Samsung fan community SamMobile, which noticed it had gone out to the Galaxy S10, Galaxy S20, Galaxy Note 10, and Galaxy Note 20 series of smartphones. One UI 3.1.1 brings better performance, new features, and other smaller improvements to the smartphones. According to SamMobile, the phones now have a faster app opening speed, fingerprint reader, camera, and better heat management. The user interface and some of the base apps also have been redesigned....

The announcement was made on Samsung’s Newsroom blog; the company claims that the new memory cards were made with photographers and content creators in mind. The Pro Plus microSD and SD cards promise fast reading and writing speeds of up to 160 megabytes per second (MB/s) and 120 MB/s, respectively. Reading and writing speeds refer to how fast an SD card transfers data, whether it’s downloading or uploading files. These cards allow users to capture high-quality 4K ultra-high definition or Full HD videos at relatively fast speeds....

What is Scener? Like Netflix Party, Scener allows you to set up a virtual movie theater and invite your friends to watch shows with you in real time, remotely. You set up a virtual theater, send your friends a code, and they can join you via their own Chrome browser. They’ll also have to have an account for Netflix and now HBO, as well, to watch anything on either streaming service....

What Is Signal Messenger? The first thing to know about Signal is that it’s similar in function to WhatsApp. That’s because Brian Acton, who founded WhatsApp, was a co-founder of the Signal app. The two apps also use an open-source encryption protocol that Acton developed, but that’s about where the similarities end. Signal is a free, secure messaging app that lets you send messages, images, and files, have phone conversations and chat individually or in groups in a secure way that’s nearly untraceable....

While the Apple Watch’s built-in sleep-tracking functionality is robust, you may prefer a third-party app with additional functionality or a different interface. We’ve gathered the best third-party sleep-tracking apps to help you get the rest you need. Pillow provides options for automatic or manual sleep tracking. The manual option means you can track sleep without having to wear (or even own) an Apple Watch. Pillow also includes detailed sleep reports, heart rate analyses, and audio recordings (for those who think they don’t snore)....

A spreadsheet offers quasi-structured data in a row and column format. However, spreadsheets don’t relate to each other and don’t require rules about the information contained in the spreadsheet. Also, spreadsheets don’t have sophisticated summarization and reporting tools. Databases collect information in a structured fashion and enforce, by default, rules, and relationships about what goes in and out. We reviewed both to aid in your determination of which one best suits your needs....