DigiTech Geeks

Acer’s Swift laptops deliver performance and portability to fit any budget If there’s anything we’ve learned from the events of the past several years, it’s that creativity and productivity can happen anywhere. No longer must makers, creators, and dreamers be tethered to an office or a kitchen table to do their best work.  And just as people shouldn’t be held back by where they work, they also shouldn’t be limited by their tools. Laptops have become essential to getting work done today, so whatever you do, you need a laptop that can keep up with you – and maybe even inspire you.  Acer is no stranger to making high-quality, powerful, affordable laptops, and the company’s updated Swift lineup continues that trend by offering the latest-generation, performance-ready Intel or AMD processors, beautiful displays, and a premium design at a price to fit any budget. Made for makers Unleash a Swift notebook on even the most demanding projects. With extreme performance condensed wi...

Don't expect to get an Amazon Kindle Scribe deal on Prime Day (or Black Friday) The new Amazon Kindle Scribe is a massive shake-up for the retail giant's line of ereaders, bringing the biggest screen and most storage we've ever seen for a Kindle, plus, for the first time, a stylus for note-taking. Interested fans, though, may be put off by the ereader's hefty $339 / £329 starting price, which goes up even higher if you want more storage or the Premium Pen with more note-taking features.  When the Amazon Kindle Scribe was first announced, its release date wasn't actually mentioned, but shortly after the launch event, Amazon confirmed the availability window via the ereader's official store listing . And there's some bad news for people looking for a cheaper device. The Kindle Scribe is officially going on sale on November 30, over two months after its announcement. But in those two months, two massive deals opportunities are happening, which means the n...

Amazon Kindle Scribe is a modern twist on an old idea - and you might like it A big-screen E Ink device equally at home with documents and books released by Amazon in the depths of an economic downturn, and it's not the Kindle Scribe that Amazon unveiled on Wednesday during a massive smart product rollout . This was the Amazon Kindle DX , a 9.7-inch E Ink reader released in 2009. It wasn't as svelte, light or bright as the 300ppi backlit Kindle Scribe. There wasn't even a touch screen, rather it had a physical keyboard and nav buttons. The Kindle DX was thought to be the future of Amazon's E Ink book business, especially for textbooks.  The device's big screen and ability to hold thousands of books would mean the end of students struggling under the weight of overstuffed backpacks filled with gargantuan and expensive textbooks. The Kindle DX cost almost $500, but most expected typical college and school textbooks to be half as expensive through Amazon's onl...

Kindle Scribe, Halo Rise, new Echo Dot and everything Amazon announced With the holiday shopping season fast approaching, we've seen big product launch events from the likes of Apple, Samsung, and plenty others. Amazon announced a slew of products covering a wide range of product categories throughout the home. Unlike the others, Amazon didn't open this event to the public, but we were invited to watch the announcement and check out details on all of the new products.  Amazon launched a few entirely new devices, starting with a long-requested Kindle you can write upon! The Kindle Scribe is a huge reading tablet that also includes a stylus for note taking. The Halo family of health-conscious gadgets got a bedside clock, the Halo Rise. The budget-friendly Amazon Fire TV brand of television sets took a step toward the upper echelons with a set that uses quantum dot QLED tech.  A number of existing Amazon products got a yearly refresh, including new Echo Dots, with some new ki...

New Amazon Kindle Scribe arrives with three surprising upgrades At the September Amazon launch event , the retail and home tech giant unveiled a major new addition to its Amazon Kindle family of ereaders, in what looks like the biggest shake-up of the line since the Kindle Keyboard. The Amazon Kindle Scribe is the first model in a new family of ereader, joining the standard Kindle, Kindle Paperwhite and Kindle Oasis. It’s Amazon's most premium Kindle yet, and brings a notable upgrade in screen size and storage space over the existing models – and it also introduces a brand-new feature to the range in the form of a stylus. The Kindle Scribe has a large (for a Kindle) 10.2-inch display, a panel which dwarfs the 7-inch screen of the Kindle Oasis , the previous Kindle heavyweight in this regard. It’s a 300 pixel-per-inch display, matching the resolution of its siblings. Because of this large screen, this is also the biggest Kindle we’ve seen in a while. Like the Oasis, it has a la...

New Amazon Kindle will have a stylus, leak says, and it'll come very soon Our ranking of the best Amazon Kindles is going to get a massive shake-up soon, according to a leaker - there's an Amazon product launch happening in a few hours, and a leaker says a brand-new family of Kindle is launching at it. This leaker, called SnoopyTech , has named the Amazon Kindle Scribe, and has provided some information about this surprise ereader, with imagery included. As with all leaks, take this with a pinch of salt, but the leaker has proven fairly reliable. Amazon Kindle Scribe, the first Kindle with Pen10,2 Inch display with 300 ppi pic.twitter.com/PDsdb7Mi7Q September 28, 2022 See more As you can see, this Kindle is said to come with a stylus, which you'd be able to use for note-taking and perhaps drawing and sketching too. Lots of entries in our list of the best ereaders have styli like this, but it'd be Amazon's first such device. The leak continues to say th...

Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 FE leak makes me think it'll be the best tablet this year It makes sense that the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 would get a budget 'FE' successor later in the year – it would follow tradition, after all – but the total lack of leaks about it made us completely forget about any prospect of a new cheap tablet from Samsung. However, a new leak does pique our interest for one big reason. The upcoming (and as yet undiscussed by leaks) tablet has been spotted in a benchmarking database, as noticed by Dutch site GalaxyClub . This listing hints toward the processing power of the tablet, showing a mid-range multi-core score, though pre-release tests like this can vary from the final product as engineers tweak the device. There's also 4GB of RAM, apparently. However that interesting tidbit that we referred to is also listed here: apparently, the tablet will run Android 13 . Other than in beta form, Android 13 isn't available on any tablets yet, though it...

The new iPad Pro 2022 might not be worth getting excited about Apple recently held a big event where it launched the iPhone 14 line and new Apple Watches, including the Apple Watch Ultra , but there’s still more to come, with new iPad Pro 2022 models possibly set to headline an event in October. That said, we’re now hearing they might not get that much limelight. According to Mark Gurman – a journalist with a good track record for Apple information – in his latest Power On newsletter for Bloomberg, the company is more likely to announce the new iPad Pros via press release than at an event. Gurman claims that both 11-inch and 12.9-inch iPad Pro models are “highly likely” to land this year, but that they won’t be a “major departure” for Apple, so won’t justify a big event. Apparently they’ll use the new M2 chipset – which has already been unveiled – along with having some “improved specifications”, but nothing drastic. Gurman claims that we’ll also probably see new Mac Minis an...

More Google Pixel Tablet details appear in the latest specs leak Officially, we haven't been given too many details on the Google Pixel Tablet yet, other than the fact that it exists and is coming in 2023. Unofficially, leaks are filling in some of the blanks when it comes to what we can expect from this slate. As reported by 91mobiles and Kuba Wojciechowski , the Pixel Tablet has apparently now entered its engineering validation test (EVT) phase, which means that it's gone beyond the prototype stage and is now being tested internally. When it comes to specs, 128GB and 256GB storage options are apparently on the way. The tablet is also said to support Wi-Fi 6 and will come with a 10.95-inch display – which is definitely on the large size for what we think will be a budget tablet . Putting the pieces together Some of the features reported in the latest leak have come up before: there's said to be a Google-made stylus being made for the Pixel Tablet, for example, and ...

I bought a refurbished iPad Pro – and likely won't buy a new gadget again I've made sure to champion second-hand products in my time at TechRadar; buying pre-loved gadgets is a great way to save money and the environment in one go. But since all the gadgets I use are review loans, I haven't actually had to buy any tech for going on four years. However, since I'll soon be leaving TechRadar, the situation is different. I'm now at a point where I have to begin buying my own tech again. I have to spend my own money on devices that I'll own – and not having been in this position for some time makes this a very scary change indeed. A recent purchase I've had to make is an iPad. While I'm not a huge fan of Apple products, some of the apps I use in my professional life are available only on iOS, ruling out Android tablets for working.  I've been offering up tech buying advice for years as part of the TechRadar team, but having to put my money where my ...

New Amazon Kindle update will change the way you read ebooks, and TikTok's to blame If you don't closely follow Amazon Kindle news – or spend too much time on BookTok, the reading-centric community on TikTok – you might not be aware of the ongoing ebook-return drama going on. But now it's prompted Amazon to change the way it handles its digital books. A TikTok trend encouraged readers to quickly read, and then return, ebooks on their Kindle, with the automatic returns program netting them a full refund even if they'd read the whole of the book.  This didn't hurt Amazon, as the readers were likely expecting, and the action actually left the authors out of pocket, as it was them who had to shell out for the refund. Plenty of ebook authors put out statements criticizing this action, and it sounds like Amazon listened (see testimonies on Twitter here and here , and a change.org petition about it here). 1/2 Every time you return an ebook at Amazon, the author i...

New Apple M2 Pro and M2 Max MacBook Pros may be coming our way very soon New rumors suggest that Apple may be launching updated MacBook Pros later this year - and they could be something very special. DigiTimes reports that the new MacBook Pro 2022 models are said to be fitted with Apple’s M2 Max and M2 Pro chips, and we’d love this to be true as the new chipset is rumored to offer a 12-Core CPU and 28-Core GPU, which is an incredible jump when you compare that to the M1 Max , which has a 10-Core CPU and 32-Core CPU. Could we see a potential new look? Even without any massive aesthetic changes, the mere suggestion that we may get updated MacBooks is certainly exciting when you consider how much we’ve been loving Apple’s recent MacBooks and Macs .  They have changed not only the way we interact with our laptops in our day to day, but our expectations for what smooth and seamless performance can be, even when it’s attached to a hefty price tag. They’re suitable for most user b...

One disappointing way the iPad 2022 will be just like the original iPad The next iPad is rumored to launch at an event in October, and we’ve been hoping for a major redesign. One of the key changes was the expected removal of the home button, bringing the base model iPad in line with the iPad Air , iPad Pro , and just about every fancy iPhone Apple sells besides the bargain-basement iPhone SE .  New rumors suggest the iPad 2022 model, the tenth generation of iPad tablet, will get a new look but will keep the familiar old button. This leak comes from a newsletter sent by Twitter leaker LeaksApplePro , available only by subscription. Presumably, this means the bezel around the screen won’t shrink too much. We’ve also heard that the sides of the device will get flattened, making it look more like the iPad Air in profile.  Our leaker also expects the next iPad will, like the more powerful iPad Pro, use USB-C. This comes from the same leak that suggested the next iPhone 15 f...

Surface Pro 9 and Surface Laptop 5 have leaked: here's what we know Right off the back of a massive Windows 11 update, Microsoft has set October 12 2022 as a big day with some big announcements. It’s around this time of year that Microsoft drops new devices, and the expectation is we will be seeing new Surface hardware.  WinFuture (often a reliable source for all things Windows) reports that the Surface Laptop 5 and the Surface Pro 9 are set to be showcased rocking the latest 12th Gen Intel processors. Roland Quant , another familiar source, suggests that both the Surface Pro 9 and Surface Laptop 5 share a few components. He suggests that the two new laptops will be equipped with the Intel Core i5-1235U and Core i7-1255U processors, and not the more powerful Alder Lake P-series.  The Surface Pro 9 5G is expected to feature a customised version of the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3, the Microsoft SQ3. Quant also claims the Surface Laptop 5 will have the same processor options....

This Chromebook lets you do your own memory and storage upgrades Google collaborated with third-party company Framework to create a customizable and upgradable Chromebook laptop. As a company, Framework specializes in developing Do-It-Yourself (DIY) laptops that people can upgrade themselves with nothing more than a screwdriver, the parts the company provides, and a bit of patience. Now with the Framework Laptop Chromebook Edition , customizable laptops have entered a new frontier as repairability in the tech industry takes a firmer stance. Customized experience Be aware that not everything on the Framework Chromebook is customizable.  Starting with the more static aspects, the laptop comes with a 13.5-inch high-resolution display (2256x1504 pixels) and a 1.5mm keyboard all housed in a chassis partially made out of recyclable material. Under the hood, it’s powered by a 12th Gen Intel Core i5-1240p CPU made out of 12 individual cores and a 55Wh battery that can last up to 10...

iPad Crayon maker slips, possibly confirms new Apple iPad Pros are coming We’ve been expecting a new Apple iPad announcement before the end of the year and now one of Apple’s closest accessory partners may have confirmed new Pro models are coming. Our friends at 9to5Mac have noticed Logitech now says that its Crayon Digital Pencil will work with two iPad Pro models that have yet to be announced. If this reflects future products, this means an update to the iPad Pro 12.9-inch and iPad Pro 11-inch tablets could be here very soon.  On the Logitech site for the Crayon, it lists compatible devices, including a “6th gen” iPad Pro 12.9 and a “4th gen” iPad Pro 11-inch. The current larger iPad Pro is on the fifth generation, and the 11-inch model is on generation three, so this would seem to be a hint at the next generation of devices. We already pegged a new iPad launch in the October timeframe, so it’s not a huge surprise to see these models poke their heads above the surface aro...

Amazon Fire HD 8 (2022): Amazon's new cheap tablet is here with three siblings The new Amazon Fire HD 8 has been launched; this 2022 update on Amazon's middle-sized tablet family replaces the 2020 model, and has four different tablets in all. That's right, Amazon has launched four tablets: there's the standard Fire HD 8, a Plus model, a Kids' Edition version and a Kids' Edition Pro device, because Amazon clearly isn't worried about confusing its buyers with too many options. These all replace members of the Amazon Fire HD 8 (2020) family, though the upgrades are quite limited. To give you an idea as to what's new, we'll run you through the new Fire HD 8 below. Amazon Fire HD 8 price and availability The new base Amazon Fire HD 8 costs $99 for 32GB storage, which is a slight price hike over the $89 / £89 starting cost of the last-gen model. A 64GB version of the tablet is also going on sale but TechRadar wasn't provided the price for that ...