Samsung may have first made an ECG-capable smartwatch with the Galaxy Watch Active2, but it wasn’t until earlier this summer that it actually got clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to enable the medical-grade feature. That announcement came in dramatic fashion at its Unpacked event in August, where the company unveiled yet another Read more about Samsung Is Rolling Out Its ECG App to Its Smartwatches Today – and only for Samsung phone owners[…]

A rural village in Wales has been suffering through internet outages and slowdowns for 18 months. The situation baffled technicians until they realized that turning off one man’s TV solved everything. On Tuesday, U.K.-based broadband provider Openreach explained in a release that every morning, around 7 a.m., residents of the Aberhosan village found themselves experiencing Read more about Village Traces 18 Months of Internet Outages to Old TV Set[…]

Scores of websites and services went down Friday afternoon due to problems with Cloudflare’s DNS service, sparking rampant speculation about the cause. After all, a global DDOS attack would totally fit the real-life apocalypse movie that 2020 is increasingly turning into. The outage, which started shortly after 5 p.m. ET, brought down popular sites and Read more about Issue with Cloudflare’s DNS service and crappy router shuts down half the web. Again.[…]

Designers often rely on their smartphones for snapping a quick photo of something that inspires them, but Pantone has found a way to turn their smartphone into a genuine design tool. As part of a new online service, it’s created a small card that can be used to accurately sample real world colors by simply Read more about The Cheap Solution for Pantone Color Picking[…]

T-Mobile’s network is having an issue with voice and data service. There was a huge spike in outage reports on Down Detector starting at around 1 PM ET today, with many people across the US suggesting on that site and Twitter that they’re having problems. By around 3:30 PM ET, Down Detector had collected more Read more about T-Mobile US outage finally ends after more than twelve hours (updated)[…]

A scientist at the University of Sydney has achieved what one quantum industry insider has described as “something that many researchers thought was impossible”. Dr. Benjamin Brown from the School of Physics has developed a type of error-correcting code for quantum computers that will free up more hardware to do useful calculations. It also provides Read more about A drastic reduction in hardware overhead for quantum computing with new error correcting techniques[…]

Amazon built robot that is designed to kill the novel coronavirus with ultraviolet light. The robot looks a little like a hotel luggage cart, with a tall metal frame attached to a rectangular wheeled bottom. One side of the frame is outfitted with at least 10 ultraviolet tube lights. In a video shared with CBS Read more about Amazon builds UV-light robot to kill coronavirus on surfaces[…]

Oh look, here’s another cautionary tale about buying cloud-based IoT kit. On 29 May, global peripheral giant Belkin will flick the “off” switch on its Wemo NetCam IP cameras, turning the popular security devices into paperweights. It’s not unusual for a manufacturer to call time on physical hardware. Like software, it has a lifespan where, Read more about Three things in life are certain: Death, taxes, and cloud-based IoT gear bricked by vendors. Looking at you, Belkin[…]

Storage vendors, including but reportedly not limited to Western Digital, have quietly begun shipping SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) disks in place of earlier CMR (Conventional Magnetic Recording) disks. SMR is a technology that allows vendors to eke out higher storage densities, netting more TB capacity on the same number of platters—or fewer platters, for the Read more about Buyer beware—that 2TB-6TB “NAS” drive you’ve been eyeing might be SMR – and won’t work in your NAS[…]

Modern transistors, which function as a computer’s brain cells, are only a few atoms long. If they are packed too tightly, that can cause all sorts of problems: electron traffic jams, overheating, and strange quantum effects. One solution is to replace some electronic circuits with optical connections that use photons instead of electrons to carry Read more about After 50 Years of Effort, Researchers Made Silicon Emit Light, could improve computer speeds vastly[…]

Purism has dropped the veil on the latest computer in its privacy-focused lineup – a small form-factor PC designed for space-conscious free software enthusiasts. Available to pre-order now, the Librem Mini packs an eighth-generation, quad-core Whiskey Lake i7-8565U processor, modified with Purism’s Pureboot technology. At its heart, this aims to minimise any potential third-party interference Read more about no Intel Management Engine: Purism lifts lid on the Librem Mini, a privacy-focused micro PC[…]

The repurposed industrial robot serves drinks in is own corner of a Japanese pub operated by restaurant chain Yoronotaki. An attached tablet computer face smiles as it chats about the weather while preparing orders. The robot, made by the company QBIT Robotics, can pour a beer in 40 seconds and mix a cocktail in a Read more about Japanese robot could call last orders on human bartenders[…]

Sonos CEO Patrick Spence just published a statement on the company’s website to try to clear up an announcement made earlier this week: on Tuesday, Sonos announced that it will cease delivering software updates and new features to its oldest products in May. The company said those devices should continue functioning properly in the near Read more about Sonos CEO apologizes for confusion, says legacy products will work ‘as long as possible’ – however long that is[…]

The Open Book Project was born from a contest held by Hackaday and that encouraged hardware hackers to find innovative and practical uses for the Arduino-based Adafruit Feather development board ecosystem. The winner of that contest was the Open Book Project which has been designed and engineered from the ground up to be everything devices Read more about An Open Source eReader That’s Free of Corporate Restrictions Is Exactly What I Want Right Now[…]

Earlier today, Apple confirmed it purchased Seattle-based AI company Xnor.ai (via MacRumors). Acquisitions at Apple’s scale happen frequently, though rarely do they impact everyday people on the day of their announcement. This one is different. Cameras from fellow Seattle-based company Wyze, including the Wyze Cam V2 and Wyze Cam Pan, have utilized Xnor.ai’s on-device people Read more about Apple’s latest AI acquisition leaves some Wyze cameras without people detection[…]

Nikon is ending its authorized repair program in early 2020, likely leaving more than a dozen repair shops without access to official parts and tools, and cutting the number of places you can get your camera fixed with official parts from more than a dozen independent shops to two facilities at the ends of the Read more about Nikon Is Killing Its Authorized Repair Program[…]

System76, the Denver-based Linux PC manufacturer and developer of Pop OS, has some stellar news for those of us who prefer our laptops a little more open. Later this month the company will begin shipping two of their laptop models with its Coreboot-powered open source firmware. The Darter Pro laptop System76 Beginning today, System76 will Read more about System76 Will Begin Shipping 2 Linux Laptops With Coreboot-Based Open Source Firmware[…]

Scientists at MIT built a 16-bit microprocessor out of carbon nanotubes and even ran a program on it, a new paper reports. Silicon-based computer processors seem to be approaching a limit to how small they can be scaled, so researchers are looking for other materials that might make for useful processors. It appears that transistors Read more about MIT Researchers Build Functional Carbon Nanotube Microprocessor[…]

Excess heat given off by smartphones, laptops and other electronic devices can be annoying, but beyond that it contributes to malfunctions and, in extreme cases, can even cause lithium batteries to explode. To guard against such ills, engineers often insert glass, plastic or even layers of air as insulation to prevent heat-generating components like microprocessors Read more about Researchers build a heat shield just 10 atoms thick to protect electronic devices[…]

By activating a dormant software lock on their newest iPhones, Apple is effectively announcing a drastic new policy: only Apple batteries can go in iPhones, and only they can install them. If you replace the battery in the newest iPhones, a message indicating you need to service your battery appears in Settings > Battery, next Read more about Apple Is Locking iPhone Batteries to Discourage Repair, showing ominous errors if you replace your battery[…]