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All Posts by Phil Nickinson

KeySmart Pro review: Tile tracking on a great key organizer is invaluable

11 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 21 Sep 2017 12:00 pm
KeySmart Pro
If you lose your keys — or if you even think you might lose your keys — then this is a no-brainer. I can't say that I've ever really lost my keys. I tend to put them in the same place every time I return home. And I keep them in the same spot in my bag when I travel. Keys, they say, are pretty important. Having written that, I now fully expect to lose my keys in the coming days. That brings...

Best smart lights for Amazon Alexa

21 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 21 Sep 2017 8:00 am
Which smart lights are the best if you're rolling with Amazon Alexa? It's a trick question. All of them are great. (OK, some are better than others.) We're starting to get to the point where smart lights are a dime a dozen. OK, they're not anywhere near that cheap yet. But prices are continuing to drop. And perhaps more important is that they basically all work with Amazon Alexa — and that...

What's new on Amazon Prime Video for October 2017

8 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 20 Sep 2017 7:22 pm
Amazon Video
There's a lot to watch on Amazon Video. Here's what's coming up in October 2017. Amazon Prime Video has is one of the go-to destinations for on-demand content, thanks in no small part to devices like the $50 Amazon Fire Stick, the $90 Amazon Fire TV, and now the $229 Amazon Echo Show. (That said, we're expecting new hardware from Amazon any day now, so maybe hold off on buying something new if...

Google Home Mini is the Amazon Echo Dot competitor we need — now it just has to sell

33 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 19 Sep 2017 3:40 pm
Google's problem hasn't been that it can't make good hardware. It's just that it's never been able to market it properly. Fun fact: Google Home is my favorite of the connected-speaker-assist-things so far. I like it more than Amazon Echo. Way more than the Echo Dot. Maybe not quite as much as Echo Show, but that's a whole 'nother product just waiting for a purpose. No, these are not to scale...

The iHome iAVS1 is a boring Echo Dot alarm clock

4 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 19 Sep 2017 12:00 pm
iHome iAVS1
It's a clock with an Amazon Echo Dot shoved inside. And I'm having no problem containing my excitement. On one hand, it's good thing that so many accessories manufacturers are jumping onto the Echo Dot bandwagon. Amazon's budget Echo is a prime candidate for cheap accessories that make it do more than was originally intended. But that may be the undoing of the iHome iAVS1 clock. iHome, of...

Best Smart Switches for Amazon Alexa

7 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 15 Sep 2017 10:00 am
Because turning on things with your fingers is so 20th century ... So you've got a home. You've got Amazon Alexa doing her thing, be it in an original Echo or an Echo Dot or maybe the new Echo Show. (Or in any one of the third-party offerings that take advantage of what she can do.) It's time to ramp things up a little more. Let's talk switches. This actually is a two-parter. It's absolutely...

iPhone X and iPhone 8 impressions from an Android user

133 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 13 Sep 2017 5:12 pm
A day after Apple completely reinvented everything all over again for a second time once more, some thoughts on what that means for the Android faithful. Apple does what Apple does. And on Tuesday at the new Steve Jobs Theater at the new Apple Park in the same old Silicon Valley, Apple unveiled the Apple Watch Series 3, Apple TV 4K, iPhone 8 and iPhone X. And in doing so, it reminded us (or at...

Amazon Echo Dot vs. Eufy Genie: Which should you buy?

5 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 12 Sep 2017 12:00 pm
Eufy Genie and Amazon Echo Dot
One is the original. The other, more than just an imitator. But should you buy the Echo Dot or the Eufy Genie? It's tempting, I know. You want to get an Amazon Echo Dot and see what the fuss is all about. And all it'll cost you is $50 — and quite often you can pick it up for less. But there's also the newer Eufy Genie. It's pretty much the same thing. Small, with a small speaker, and the...

Amazon Echo Show review: Alexa gets fancy

13 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 8 Sep 2017 12:00 pm
The quick take Amazon adds a touchscreen and camera to a couple of decent speakers, giving us the best Echo yet for only $50 more than what the original Alexa device is selling for. Video calling is an easy-to-use (if still novel) feature, and Amazon's paving the way for developers to make use of the 7-inch display. Now it just has to get them to update those thousands of skills to take...

How your phone can help before and during a hurricane

45 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 8 Sep 2017 11:06 am
Hurricanes Irma, Jose and Katia
Ed. Note: We're re-upping this since Hurricane Harvey Irma decided to make life difficult on a lot of folks in Texas in the islands and Florida and Georgia and the Carolinas. Stay safe out there, everybody. And if you're told to evacuate, DO IT! For the latest on any storm, visit the National Hurricane Center. Hurricane season is here, a storm threatens, and your smartphone is now one of the...

Kids favorite 'If You Give A Mouse A Cookie' coming to Amazon Prime Video

3 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 7 Sep 2017 9:37 am
If you give a mouse a cookie
Amazon Originals brings an old classic and some new favorites to Prime Video this fall. If you have kids, there's a pretty good chance you've read "If You Give A Mouse a Cookie." And the classic tale is coming to Amazon Prime Video as an Amazon Kids Original on Nov. 7. That's the headliner of Amazon's fall lineup. We'll also see "Wishenpoof" land Sept. 26, and "Sigmund and the Sea Monsters" hit...

Amazon's looking to take over a(nother) town near you!

28 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 7 Sep 2017 7:01 am
Amazon's Seattle Campus
Amazon's looking to employe 50,000 people at a new campus somewhere in North America. Amazon's Seattle campus. (Source: Amazon) Ask anyone who's in or around Seattle (our own Andrew Martonik can attest to this) and they'll quickly tell you about Amazon's impact in that city, which sports its massive headquarters. It's huge. How huge? Try this on for size: Thirty-three buildings with a total 8...

Eharmony and Alexa team up to make finding a date that much more weird

5 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 6 Sep 2017 11:00 am
eHarmony and Alexa
Finding a date has never been easier. Or harder. It's a hard-easy, really. I've been married for 13 years next week. I can't even imagine what it's like to do that in the age of smartphones and dating apps and Instagram and text messages. I am old. Also: There's now an Amazon Alexa Skill that ties eharmony to your Amazon account. So you can find more info on potential lifelong partners without...

Kirin 970's dual image signal processors make the Galaxy S8 camera look like a blurry mess, Huawei says

36 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 2 Sep 2017 8:44 am
Huawei Kirin 970
It's definitely an understatement to say that the Samsung Galaxy S8 has a more-than capable camera. From the sensor to the lens to the image signal processing, no one would deny this fact. Huawei, however, has a few things to say about that. The Chinese behemoth unveiled its new Kirin 970 processor today at the IFA conference in Berlin. In addition to cramming in 5.5 billion transistors on a...

Amazon's new multi-room audio is a Sonos competitor — if you don't care about quality

22 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 31 Aug 2017 10:00 am
Sonos Playbar
So Amazon Echo — or, more specifically, the OG Echo, Echo Dot, and Echo Show — can now do multi-room audio. That is, they can all play the same music at the same time, in different rooms. That's a big deal. If you sell multiple speakers, you need to be able to do multi-room playback. Amazon's nearest direct competitor in this sort of thing — that'd be Google and Google Home — has done this for...

5 Alexa-enabled devices you need to check out!

7 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 31 Aug 2017 9:00 am
Vobot
Echo isn't the only Alexa-enabled device in town. What can you use Amazon Alexa with? What can't you use with it in 2017 actually is the better question to ask. But in addition to being able to use Alexa to control various devices, Alexa also comes baked into any number of products. That means you won't necessarily need to have an actual Amazon Echo laying around. And while not all of these...

6 reasons why you should consider a Ring Doorbell (and 3 reasons you shouldn't)

44 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 30 Aug 2017 11:00 am
Ring Pro
I have a lot of connected tech in my home. Maybe too much. But a smart doorbell — the Ring Pro, specifically — is one of the keepers. A $200 doorbell is a little exorbitant. Let's just get that out of the way now. But as I've said time and time again, the Ring Doorbell has quickly become one of those crazy pieces of tech that just works, and that has become damned near indispensable for me and...

Amazon Echo review 2017

11 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 30 Aug 2017 9:54 am
Amazon Echo
The original Echo has held up well over the years, even if it is (erm, or was) a little expensive. Now it's only going to get better. Ed. Note: We've reviewed the Amazon Echo a couple times now. First in February 2015, not long after it was first released. We took another look at it in November of that year, to see where things stood. Now that we're expecting an updated Echo later this year,...

Amazon Echo Dot review 2017

6 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 29 Aug 2017 1:05 pm
Amazon Echo Dot
Amazon's smallest and least expensive Echo is the one most folks should start with — and for many folks it's all they'll need. Ed. Note: We first reviewed the Amazon Echo Dot in April 2016. In that time it's undergone a hardware revision, and Alexa — the brains inside every Echo device — has continued to gain functionality. So we're taking a fresh look at the Echo Dot in the context of where...

Amazon adds multi-room audio to Echo, Echo Dot and Echo Show

22 Comments
Posted by Phil Nickinson on 29 Aug 2017 9:31 am
You can now listen to Amazon Music — and other services — simultaneously across multiple Echo devices. Long expected and highly anticipated, Amazon today announced that its flagship Echo devices now support synchronized music playback. Multi-room audio, that is. It works on the original Echo, the venerable Echo Dot, and the new Echo Show. You'll set up groups of devices in the Alexa app (go...

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