The Lamborghini-inspired Dry Studio Black Diamond 75 gaming keyboard is more cool than cringe
It may be a 75 percent layout, but this hefty keyboard is anything but compact.
Angry Miao usually specializes in bespoke mechanical keyboards with zany or nonsensical designs that cost small fortunes. But today, its new Japan-based sub-brand, Dry Studio, is announcing a Lamborghini-inspired gaming keyboard that looks like a futuristic race car on your desk, yet it clocks in at a price some of us mere mortals can actually stomach.
It’s called the Black Diamond 75, a pre-built 75 percent mechanical keyboard (switches, PBT keycaps, and PCB-mounted stabilizers all included and preinstalled) with an integrated wrist wrest, and it starts at just $240 once it goes live on Indiegogo on September 26th — with expected shipments in November.
A respectable $240 for the base model or $295 for an even fancier special edition
The...
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Android 14 beta adds the ability to use your phone as a webcam
The camera on devices like the Pixel 7 Pro (pictured) will be vastly superior to the majority of dedicated webcams. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
The Android 14 QPR1 Beta 1 update released for Pixel devices on Wednesday enables an upcoming Android feature to use your phone as a webcam. The new webcam capability doesn’t rely on third-party apps or software and instead requires physically connecting the phone to a laptop or desktop computer via a USB cable (seen via XDA-Developers).
The feature is located in the “Charging this device via USB” option that appears in the notification tray after the phone is connected. Swapping to the new “Webcam” option within the “Use USB for” section will then provide on-screen instructions to configure the webcam video feed, with options to zoom in / out and switch between the device’s front and rear cameras.
The new webcam feature is currently s...
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Amazon will charge you to use its new Echo Show 8 as a digital photo frame
The special “Photos Edition” of the new Show 8 costs extra to show your photos as the “primary content.” | Photo by Alex Cranz / The Verge
Amazon is finally turning its Echo Show into a proper digital photo frame, but you have to pay extra for the privilege. Announced at its fall hardware event this week, the new Echo Show 8 Photos Edition costs $10 more than the standard edition of the new smart display but lets you make your photos the “primary home screen content.”
The Show 8 Photos Edition is coming this Fall for $159.99 and has all the same features as the new Echo Show 8 (third-gen). But for the extra $10, you get a six-month subscription to Amazon’s new PhotosPlus service, which enables this new “enhanced photo mode.”
PhotosPlus enables Photo Mode, making personal memories and photos shared by family and friends the primary content you see on the Echo Show 8 Photos...
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Case-Mate’s see-through Fuel Chargers are on sale starting at just $10
Most of Case-Mate’s colorful chargers are on sale at Woot and Amazon. | Image: Case-Mate
Happy iPhone 15 day! If you were planning on picking up Apple’s newest smartphone now that it’s officially available, why not pick up a USB-C charger to go with it? Now until October 3rd, Case-Mate’s 30W Fuel Charger ison sale at Woot in blue, orange, and white with a 90-day warranty for just $9.99 ($20 off). You can also buy the lime green version on Amazon for just $5 more using the on-page coupon.
With their colorful, semi-translucent design, Case-Mate’s see-through wall chargers seem to take a cue from the vibrant iMacs and N64 controllers of the late-’90s. They don’t just look cool, either; each charger is outfitted with a USB-C port that is capable of delivering up to 30W of power, allowing you to charge your smartphone, tablet,...
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How to assess ‘sustainable’ products and your own impact as a consumer
Some of Apple’s new watches will be carbon neutral, the company announced this month. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
These days, brands are all about selling you something more sustainable. In just the past week, we’ve seen Apple launch its first carbon-neutral products and Amazon start to share pollution reports for individual devices.
GM sponsored a major hub for events during New York City’s Climate Week, coinciding with a United Nations climate summit. I walked past its electric vehicles displayed in a conference hall outside a panel about living in a changing climate.
Down the hall, I grabbed “locally sourced, plant-based nourishments” from a cafeteria featuring recipes by Hellmann’s (maker of the mayonnaise). Trying to decide between a chicken farro bowl and a Tuscan kale salad, I realized that the numbers on the menu didn’t represent calories...
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You asked, and we answered your burning iPhone 15 questions
Who you gonna call when you have very specific questions about the new iPhone? | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge
Ever since our reviews for the iPhone 15 and 15 Pro went up on Tuesday morning, you’ve had a ton of questions to ask about the phones — in comments, on The Vergecast, on Threads, an Instagram App, and in a live Q&A. So we thought we’d put all that information together in a nice little smorgasbord of nerdy tidbits and philosophical pondering and pick out a few favorites in the process.
I deeply respect a settings menu question
Post by @allisonjo1 View on Threads
Since the mute switch is going away, Apple put an indicator in the status bar so you can check if your ringer is silenced at a glance. But what if you find it annoying and want it to go away? Great news: you will have the power to banish it from sight.
We almost got...
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Amazon is sticking ads on Prime Video shows and movies unless you pay more
Your Prime Video experience is about to be downgraded unless you cough up an extra $3 each month. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Amazon has announced plans to start placing “limited advertisements” in TV shows and movies running on the company’s Prime Video streaming platform, to allow the e-commerce giant to “continue investing in compelling content.” According to Amazon’s press release, the ads will first be introduced on Prime Video content in the US, UK, Germany, and Canada on an unmentioned date in “early 2024,” with France, Italy, Spain, Mexico, and Australia to follow later that year.
Amazon says it doesn’t have plans to change the current price of its Prime memberships in 2024, and Prime members will be notified of the change several weeks before the ad injections begin, along with details to sign up for the ad-free option. US-based Prime members will be...
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The latest Windows 11 update will help you ditch passwords for good
Microsoft takes its next step towards a passwordless future. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Microsoft’s incoming Windows 11 update will introduce public support for passkeys — a passwordless login technology that instead uses your face, fingerprint, or device PIN to sign into accounts. Announced at Microsoft’s AI and Surface launch event on Thursday, the latest Windows 11 update (available from September 26th) will allow users to create, manage, and store passkeys, and use them to access supported websites and services using their device’s own authentication systems.
Microsoft began testing passkey management in the Windows Insider developer channel back in June, so this Windows 11 update is bringing the technology into general availability.
Windows 11 passkeys are created through Windows Hello. Passkeys can be accessed on both...
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Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard deal gets preliminary approval from UK regulator
Illustration by William Joel / The Verge
The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has given preliminary approval for Microsoft to proceed with its $69 billion Activision Blizzard deal. The CMA had originally blocked the acquisition over cloud gaming concerns, but Microsoft recently restructured the deal to transfer cloud gaming rights for current and new Activision Blizzard games to Ubisoft.
“The CMA considers that the restructured deal makes important changes that substantially address the concerns it set out in relation to the original transaction earlier this year,” the CMA said in a press release, and “opens the door to the deal being cleared.”
This is just a preliminary decision, ahead of final approval. The CMA says it has now opened a consultation to gain...
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Hulu’s No One Will Save You is taut, minimalist sci-fi horror
Image: 20th Century Studios
No One Will Save You wastes no time getting started. After a brief setup, it gets right to the action: a home invasion that’s actually an alien invasion. What follows is an incredibly tense, surprisingly quiet mix of sci-fi and horror, just the thing for a fall evening at home.
The movie — which is streaming now on Hulu — comes via writer and director Brian Duffield, who previously wrote similar genre twists The Babysitter and Love and Monsters. It centers on Brynn (Kaitlyn Dever), a young woman who lives alone in a big, isolated house and who — for reasons that aren’t clear until much later in the story — is either ignored or hated by basically everyone in town. But she keeps herself busy making dresses, constructing a model village,...
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Valve: don’t expect a faster Steam Deck ‘in the next couple of years’
The Steam Deck. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge
Valve has been clear it wants to build a Steam Deck 2 — and equally clear that a faster handheld wouldn’t arrive soon. Now, Valve’s Pierre-Loup Griffais tells The Verge and CNBC that it could be late 2025 or beyond before it raises that bar — because it wants to see a leap in performance without a significant hit to battery life.
“I don’t anticipate such a leap to be possible in the next couple of years,” he told me via email.
Here’s the whole quote:
It’s important to us that the Deck offers a fixed performance target for developers, and that the message to customers is simple, where every Deck can play the same games. As such, changing the performance level is not something we are taking lightly, and we only want to do so when there is...
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X is shutting down Circles
Illustration: The Verge
X is planning to shut down Circles, a feature that lets you share posts with a limited group of people instead of all of your followers. The company said in a “PSA” on Thursday that Circles will be disabled by October 31st.
“After this date, you will not be able to create new posts that are limited to your Circle, nor will you be able to add people to your Circle,” X wrote in a post on its help center. “You will, however, be able to remove people from your Circle,” and the company gave instructions on how to do that.
Twitter (not X) officially launched Circles (which it called “Circle”) in August 2022; Elon Musk wasn’t yet the official owner of the company. (At that time, he was trying to get out of his deal to buy it.) But in April,...
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Eight things we learned from Intel’s Innovation keynote
Photo by Tomohiro Ohsumi/Getty Images
Intel has wrapped up its annual Innovation event in San Jose, where the chipmaker gave us a glimpse of what’s coming down the pipeline over the next few years. In case you don’t have a spare hour and a half to sit down and watch CEO Pat Gelsinger’s keynote, here are some important things we learned.
Meteor Lake will launch on December 14th
If you haven’t guessed, AI was kind of a theme here.
The company officially introduced its “Meteor Lake” generation (known officially as the Intel Core Ultra) to the world at the Innovation keynote. These will succeed the 13th-Gen “Raptor Lake” line; they will be the first chips built on the new Intel 4 process and its first with a dedicated AI coprocessor inside.
They’re also...
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The iPhone 15 has a new optimized charging setting, here’s how it works
You can limit the battery charge to 80 percent on the iPhone 15 and 15 Pro. This is apparently in response to complaints about the iPhone 14 Pro’s battery capacity issues. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge
Apple has detailed how the iPhone 15’s new 80 percent charging limit setting works in an update to a support document.
Here’s Apple’s explanation of what you can expect if you enable the setting:
When you choose 80% Limit, your iPhone will charge up to about 80 percent and then stop charging. If the battery charge level gets down to 75 percent, charging will resume until your battery charge level reaches about 80 percent again.
As we’ve been testing the setting on our review devices, we noticed that our phones have been charging past 80 percent anyway. That’s apparently something you can expect to see happen occasionally, according to Apple.
With 80% Limit enabled, your iPhone will occasionally charge to 100 percent to maintain accurate...
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Spotify code suggests HiFi tier is coming with lossless audio for $20 / month
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge
Spotify’s long-awaited HiFi tier could finally be getting closer to launch. Code within the Spotify app reveals new details about the “Supremium” tier, which could feature 24-bit lossless audio, the ability to create playlists with AI, and more, as spotted by u/Hypixely on Reddit.
Spotify first announced the more expensive HiFi tier in February 2021, but the feature has been stuck in limbo since then. The last we heard about the tier was in June of this year when a Bloomberg report found Spotify had rebranded the HiFi tier as “Supremium.” The Redditor’s findings corroborate this claim, as they say Spotify now refers to the audio as lossless with “no lag and delays.”
Image: u/Hypixely via Reddit
Additionally, the...
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How to turn off NameDrop in iOS 17
Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge
iOS 17 offers a lot of interesting new features for your iPhone, one of which is called, appropriately, NameDrop. What NameDrop does is let you exchange contact information with another iPhone (and gives you a chance to use your snazzy new Contact Poster) by just holding the top of your phone near the top of someone else’s iPhone.
You turn off NameDrop by using the AirDrop settings.
Obviously, that’s not something that will often happen by accident, but if you still don’t like the idea of accidentally triggering NameDrop with somebody else — or if you tend to carry two phones in your bag and don’t want them to be trying to exchange contact info all afternoon — you can quickly and easily turn it off. Here’s how:
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Amazon’s rumored home projector can turn anything into a screen
Amazon’s first projector project, the Amazon Glow, folded in failure last year. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge
Amazon is reportedly working on a projector that would turn any surface in your home into a screen, as reported by Reuters. People familiar with the matter told the news organization that the projector is designed to do things like beam a recipe on the wall above a stove and make Zoom calls that track you as you move around the house.
A touch interactive projected screen is an obvious move for the ambient smart home that Amazon has long proposed, one where the tech appears when you need it and disappears when you don’t. I mean, that's literally the definition of a projector.
When I reviewed Amazon’s first attempt at a smart projector, the now-discontinued Amazon Glow, I said that it would have made more sense as a smart home control...
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Mastodon gets better search, onboarding, and cross-server interactions
Image: The Verge
Mastodon, the federated microblogging platform, has been updated to version 4.2, which comes with massive improvements to search and the web interface, particularly for logged-out and first-time users.
One of Mastodon’s many charming qualities is that, unlike ~~Twitter~~ X, Bluesky, Instagram, and most other social media platforms, the user base is split across thousands of instances, each of which can decide to federate with or block any of the others.
This is good in many ways. You can get a nice little intentional community going on your local server, and servers that are filled with abusive, illegal, and harmful content and / or users are widely ostracized. But it presents some, shall we say, unintuitive workflows for people used to...
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Nintendo now supports passwordless sign-ins
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Nintendo has added support for passkeys, a passwordless sign-in method that uses your fingerprint, face scan, or other methods to give you access to your online accounts. As spotted earlier by NintendoSoup (via 9to5Mac), Nintendo now lets you register and use a passkey to sign in to your account from a variety of different devices.
To add a passkey to your account, head to accounts.nintendo.com from the device you want to use the passkey. Once you sign in to your Nintendo account, hit Sign-in and security settings > Passkeys > Edit. Then, select Register a new passkey and follow the steps to complete the setup process on the device you’re using.
Right now, Nintendo only supports passkeys on devices with iOS 16 or later, iPadOS 16 or...
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Environmental conservation in Brazil: more investments, fewer ‘stupid decisions’
Image: Brazil Climate Summit
At the moment I arrived at the Brazil Climate Summit event, it felt like home to me. As I opened the door to The Forum at Columbia University, I heard dozens of people speaking my language for the first time in 11 days. God, are we loud — and I love it. Entering the bathroom after breakfast, I saw two women brushing their teeth — Brazilians carry a toothbrush in their purse and flee to the office or event bathroom after eating.
You may wonder why Brazil is pursuing this agenda in New York. First of all, because of the UN climate summit — which happens this week. Second, they want to show international investors the power of the country — not only economically but environmentally as well.
According to The World Bank, Brazil holds more...
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TikTok is testing Google results in its search pages
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge
TikTok search results pages could soon have a link to Google results.
A feature spotted by app researcher Radu Oncescu shows the TikTok search results page including a link to search Google for the same query (via Insider). In another screenshot shared by Oncescu, a TikTok pop-up reads, “TikTok does not endorse or take responsibility for search results from Google.”
Google declined to comment. TikTok didn’t immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment but confirmed to Insider that it’s testing the feature in some markets.
The addition of Google results linked in the TikTok app is the latest and most notable example of the shortform video app leaning into search. Earlier this month, we noticed that TikTok had quietly been a...
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An early iPhone 15 Pro teardown looks inside Apple’s new flagship phone
Image: PBKreviews via YouTube
Want to get a look at the inside of the iPhone 15 Pro? The flagship handheld hasn’t even started shipping yet, but the folks over at PBKreviews have already taken apart the device, revealing the redesigned midframe chassis, along with all the components nestled beneath the iPhone 15 Pro’s screen and glass backing.
The video starts with the careful removal of the display using a screen disassembly device and a plastic pick. From there, PBKreviews disconnects the screen from the body of the phone and removes a series of cables. That’s when we get a good look at the iPhone 15’s camera assembly, which has three Phillips screws holding it down.
Image: PBKreviews via YouTube
The camera assembly on the iPhone 15 Pro.
A...
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Microsoft hopes people won’t become ‘over-reliant’ on its AI assistant
Photo by Chris Welch/The Verge
This morning, Microsoft set the release date for its AI-powered Copilot feature and showed off some of its capabilities for the first time. At a “Responsible AI” panel following the announcement, company executives spoke about the danger of over-reliance on its generative software, which was shown creating blog posts, images, and emails based on user prompts.
Six months after the company laid off the team dedicated to upholding responsible AI principles in the products it shipped, the execs attempted to make a clear statement onstage: Everything is fine. Responsible AI is still a thing at Microsoft. And Copilot isn’t going to take your job.
“The product being called Copilot is really intentional,” said Sarah Bird, who leads responsible...
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Razer wants to make over your living room with its own smart gamer lights
Razer’s vision of your future. | Image: Razer
Razer now has its own light bulb. And two lamps. And a flexible LED lighting strip. They’re all filled with RGB LEDs, they all sync with other RGB products in Razer’s Chroma network, and they’re all coming by the end of this year.
Together, they could theoretically help you create the picture at the top of this story, which I am led to believe is a depiction of a “Gamer Room.” There are no words.
But there are products, ones named Aether, which might look nice individually.
Image: Razer
The Aether Light Bulb will cost $50 a pop when it arrives later this year; it’s a 2.4GHz Wi-Fi bulb that puts out the typical 800 lumens of light you’d expect from a 60-watt equivalent (but tops out at 9W since it’s LED) and can...
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Amazon’s Echo Show 10 is receiving its biggest discount since Prime Day
One of the Show 10’s best features is its swiveling stand, which allows it to follow you as you move around the room. | Photo by Dan Seifert / The Verge
Amazon may have announced a new soundbar, a third-gen Echo Show 8, and a slew of other devices during its recent fall hardware event, but one thing it didn’t introduce is a successor to the Echo Show 10. That means the third-gen model introduced in 2021 remains the latest version, one that’s on sale at Amazon for $184.99 ($65 off) when you redeem the on-page discount or use promo code ECHOSHOW10. (Note: at least one of our staffers could not see the optional, so just be aware that it may not be available in all instances.)
Amazon’s Alexa-equipped Echo Show 10 continues to be the best smart display you can get for video calls — especially given Google’s Nest Hub Max is dropping support for Google Meet and Zoom. Overall, the Show is a...
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Razer goes after the Herman Miller Aeron with its Fujin gaming chair
The Razer Fujin. | Image: Razer
I sit in a Herman Miller Aeron every single day — so my eyes absolutely popped when I saw the Razer Fujin for the first time.
I know, lots of chairs have tried to duplicate the Aeron’s legendary stretchy mesh ergonomics and iconic shape since its 1994 debut. What’s so special about this one?
Well, the company’s $999 ($1,049 in the US) Fujin Pro model adds the two most desirable upgrades for the Aeron, IMHO: the twist-to-adjust lumbar support, and the adjustable matching headrest that launched an entire aftermarket company to do what Herman Miller wouldn’t. I gush about the Atlas headrest on my chair to anyone who’ll listen.
Image: Razer
The Razer Fujin Pro.
Image: Razer
The Fujin Pro’s...
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Lego’s awesome $60 Super Mario Piranha Plant just earned a spot in my brick garden
You can put Lego Mario coins inside! | Image: Lego
For the past few years, Lego has been releasing a collection of intricate, affordable sets for adults who want a touch of green in their lives without pruning or watering, like the Lego Bonsai Tree, Orchid, and Succulents. Now, there’s a Mario set fit to join them.
Lego’s just introduced the Lego Super Mario Piranha Plant, a $60 540-piece set that looks absolutely fantastic without breaking the bank. It kinda-sorta is a bank, too: you can hide at least a couple coins inside! Two Mario coins come with the set.
Image: Lego
You can open up its chompers, pose its stem and leaves, and Lego says you can literally build it from the ground up — “so the Piranha Plant emerges as if it’s growing out of the pipe,” reads the...
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Hyundai is offering free home chargers and install discounts for new EV buyers
Hyundai’s home charger install deal only works with residential properties. | Image: Hyundai
If you were holding off on buying an EV because you didn’t know where to start on getting a home charger installed, Hyundai’s new deal might help you out. The automaker is now offering a free home electric vehicle charger plus up to $600 off the installation cost with the purchase or lease of select Hyundai EVs.
Hyundai is offering up the ChargePoint Home Flex Level 2 charger on the Hyundai Home Marketplace. The charger is currently listed at $549 on the website and supports up to 50 amps, which could get you around 37 miles of driving range per hour of charging. The additional $600 installation credit applies only to services ordered through Hyundai’s website.
To qualify for the deal, you’ll need to follow this process:
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