New Gadgets

The rumored 2022 MacBook Air didn't make an appearance at Apple's year-opening event earlier this month, proving some release-date speculation wrong. But the latest buzz indicates that a new MacBook Air with an M2 processor could still arrive in the second half of the year. On top of that, a new prediction from reliable analyst Ross Young's Display Supply Chain Consultants says to look out for a MacBook Air with a 15-inch display in 2023 -- an upsize from the current Air's 13.3 inches.
The MacBook Air has undergone many revisions since the original 2008 version, and the current physical design dates from March 2020, when Apple released what was probably the final Intel-powered version of the laptop. Later that year, in November, the MacBook Air was one of three Macs to upgrade to Apple's new M1 chips, although there were no other design or feature changes.
November 2021, and now Apple's March event, have passed without a new MacBook Air -- but we're still keeping our eyes peeled. Here are the changes we're mostly likely to see in a 2022 MacBook Air.

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Long-awaited DC superhero epic The Batman is out now in theaters (but not HBO Max), pitting Robert Pattinson's Dark Knight detective against the puzzle-obsessed Riddler (Paul Dano). Writer-director Matt Reeves' movie sees the creepy supervillain killing Gotham City's elites and exposing its extremely seedy underbelly. It also has a post-credits Easter egg for people who stick around.
Batman isn't alone in his campaign; he teams up with Selina Kyle (aka Catwoman, played by Zoë Kravitz) to investigate the city's traditional criminals, while GCPD Lieutenant James Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) is a vital ally in the hunt for Riddler.

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With its giant screen, four-lens camera system, top-notch zoom lens and an S Pen stylus that you can stow inside the phone, Samsung's Galaxy S22 Ultra is a tempting choice. But at $1,200, it's also one of the most expensive phones Samsung sells.
That's why it's important to think carefully about whether it's time to upgrade to the Galaxy S22 Ultra. In many cases, the most important factors to consider will be camera quality and the S Pen. If you have a relatively recent phone like the Galaxy S21 Ultra or Note 20 Ultra, you don't need to upgrade just yet. The S22 Ultra is more of an iterative update to those devices, and you'll get more for your money by holding onto your device for a longer period of time.

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With the arrival of the DirectStorage API for Windows, game developers have begun talking about what it could mean for future games. The technology is currently in-use on the Xbox Series X and is part of the console’s Velocity Architecture. It allows for faster loading and decompression of game assets, quick resumption of paused games, and eliminates various I/O bottlenecks. Since game developers have to implement it in future games, it’ll be awhile before we can experience it. However, Forspoken is a game currently in development that uses it, and it will arrive in October. At the Game Developers Conference this week, the game’s Technical Director, Teppei Ono, shared some of its possible benefits.

According to Forspoken’s Ono, one second load times are within the realm of possibility. The bad news is they were unable to show that in-game.

Ono said over time, more improvements will be forthcoming. The issue seems to be DirectStorage is currently designed to eliminate SSD I/O bottlenecks.

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Dyson Dyson's new Zone air-purifying headphone looks like something you'd see in a dystopian sci-fi movie. But it's a real device you'll be able to buy sometime this fall, Dyson says.

For Dyson -- a company that's best known for its high-end vacuum cleaners -- it's the first foray into wearable technology. The Zone is a set of noise-canceling, over-ear headphones that "simultaneously deliver immersive sound to the ears and purified airflow to the nose and mouth," addressing the "urban issues of air quality and noise pollution." No word yet on pricing, but it seems safe to assume that these will cost more than your typical premium noise-canceling headphones from Bose and Sony, and maybe even more than Apple's AirPods Max headphones.

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If your Samsung Galaxy S21 is acting wonky, Samsung says it wants to help you avoid spending lots of money at a repair shop. This summer the company will launch a new program to ship you the parts, tools and repair guides to let you fix your own device.

The program is starting small: Only owners of the Samsung Galaxy S21 and Galaxy S20 range of devices, and the Galaxy Tab S7 Plus tablet, will be eligible at first. The company plans to add more devices, but it declined to say when or which gadgets, like its latest Samsung Galaxy S22 family, would be added first.
Self-repair website iFixit is consulting with Samsung to improve iFixit's repair guides and parts offerings, though the extent of the partnership is unclear. Still, bringing iFixit on board lends the program some cachet given the site's guides and support for consumers' right to repair their own devices.

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Intel officially launched its Arc family of graphics solutions yesterday. We say “solutions” instead of “cards” because the first chips to arrive will be mobile GPUs. The launch info consisted of a ton of slides and explainers, as well as a 20 minute video presentation. At the very end of the video Intel pulled a Steve Jobs, adding “one more thing.” That one thing just happens to be what a lot of gamers are actually waiting for: Intel’s discrete desktop gaming card.

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Like last year's Galaxy A52 5G, Samsung's new Galaxy A53 5G packs a lot of functionality for the price. It has a roomy 6.5-inch screen and a camera system that includes lenses for wide, ultrawide and macro shots. At $450, it's also $50 cheaper than its predecessor and is guaranteed to get at least four generations of Android updates. It supports all three flavors of 5G: sub-6Ghz, C-band and millimeter wave.

• Big screen
• Long battery life
• Versatile camera for the price
• Four years of Android updates
• Expandable storage

Don't Like

• Some performance lag
• Screen can be hard to see in bright sunlight

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AMD has acknowledged that its GPU drivers are also overclocking AMD CPUs in systems where Radeon and Ryzen are sharing space. This doesn’t appear to be happening in every case, but it may occur if you use one of AMD’s Radeon profiles.

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Samsung's Galaxy Watch 4 was lauded for its health-tracking functionality, fast performance and a slick design, when it was released last August. It was even the first smartwatch powered by the new Wear OS software that Samsung and Google created together. But if rumors become a reality, the Galaxy Watch 5 could address one of our biggest complaints about the Galaxy Watch 4: Its battery life.

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