It’s a slower-than-usual October in the tech industry, largely thanks to Google and Microsoft making their typical fall hardware announcements earlier this year. Still, we’ve seen quite a few companies unveil new devices over the past two weeks Amazon’s October Prime Day he was excited. Whether you’re shopping or watching Elon Musk speak robotaxis and cybervansThe Engadget team continued their review of recently (and not so recently) launched products. This is as usual the biweekly roundup is here to help you catch upalthough since I missed last week’s release (due to being off work), the cadence was a bit off.
From Meta’s Quest 3S VR headset and DJI Air 3S drone to Sony’s mid-range audio gear suite, these weeks have been all about the less premium, more affordable “non-flagships” that happened to be. And it turns out, you don’t need to throw away some of your retirement savings at companies to get solid devices that offer value for money.
Sony LinkBuds Fit and LinkBuds Open and Bose QuietComfort Earbuds reviews
By Billy Steele
Sony
Sony flexes its mobile audio muscle in the LinkBuds Fit, combining great sound with tons of features.
- Small, convenient design
- Surprisingly big sound
- Lots of useful features
- ANC performance is lacking
- Battery life
- Call quality is good but not great
The main thing I learned from Billy’s recent reviews Sony and Bose headphones Flagship, premium-level noise cancellation is making its way to mid-range products. And I, for one, am happy about it. It seems like most of what you’ll be missing out on if you save a little money are spatial audio, head tracking, and features that should make for a more immersive, intuitive listening experience. Personally, I miss these things for now – I really want decent sound, good sound quality and competent background noise reduction.
Even if you’re not in the market for headphones, be sure to check out Billy’s review of Sony’s LinkBuds trio, as he put his ears through literal pain to try out the oddly designed headphones for us. In fact, the title rejected for the review was “Why Do I Hurt?” We welcome you, Billy.
By Devindra Hardawar
Meta
The Meta Quest 3S offers immersive virtual reality for just $300. It’s fast, comfortable to wear, and has plenty of games and VR experiences to choose from.
- Fast performance
- It is comfortable to wear
- Great controllers
- Large software library
- Older Fresnel lenses cause artifacts
- No headphone jack
- Average mixed reality cameras
The Quest is arguably the industry-leading VR headset for consumers, especially considering that some of the alternatives cost more while offering a relatively high-quality immersive experience. Unlike the $3,500 Apple Vision Pro, the new Quest 3S It’s tastier than $300. And as Devindra observed in his opinionit’s convenient, fast, and gives users access to Meta’s large library of VR apps and content. To quote Devindra, “It’s not Meta’s first $300 VR headset, but it’s still a big achievement.”
DJI Neo and DJI Air 3S reviews
By Steve Dent
DJI
DJI’s Air 3S is the company’s first consumer drone with LiDAR, designed to make night flying safer.
- Excellent picture quality
- LiDAR improves obstacle detection at night
- ActiveTrack produces 360 cinematic tracking shots
- Long battery life
- It now has 42GB of internal memory
- Sometimes it cannot detect small obstacles
Continuing the trend of great products that are cheaper than ever, DJI Neo it’s a great drone for only $200. It might sound hyperbolic to call it the best $200 drone ever made, but we can’t think of any other drone that costs the same price that comes close to performing similarly to the Neo. Although one of its main flaws, according to our reviewer Steve, is that it sounds like a banshee, I honestly think it would be a pro for me just for pure comedy. I never thought I’d be in the market for a drone with a banshee sound, but here I think $200 would be a fair price to pay for the aerial videos I could get, and I could sing a comfortable, snappy song over the footage anyway. .
At the other end of the spectrum, Steve also experimented the high-end DJI Air 3S drone and Canon EOS R5 IIboth will cost you more money. The good news is that Canon’s EOS R5 II has now been improved to the point where it takes on Sony’s rival offering while also bringing interesting features such as eye-tracking autofocus. Of course, it’s too early to be sure. But if you have the money for these premium products, you’ll be exposed to the latest technology, perhaps part of the appeal is that they don’t always work well.
By Dan Cooper
remarkable / Engadget
reMarkable adds a color screen to the e-paper tablet, creating a distraction-free, best-in-class writing experience.
- Color is a welcome and useful addition
- The backlight allows you to work in dark environments
- Significantly improved performance
I know Dan was a little worried about giving away a device ReMarkable Paper Pro such a high score, but after some discussion we both agreed it was appropriate. By the way, the reMarkable Paper Pro is the best e-paper writing tablet with a color screen even after its announcement this week. Amazon’s first color Kindle. Per Dan’s reviewPaper Pro has not only upped the ante by adding color, but has also become faster and more reliable in the process.
I particularly enjoy how much attention has been paid to blending handwriting and typed text more seamlessly for a more natural note-taking and annotation experience. Plus, while it’s outside the general theme of this post, it’s a cheaper product with premium features, I’m still incredibly motivated to find ways to cough up the $600 it takes to bag the Paper Pro with the accessories Dan recommends.
Reviews of Phoenix Springs and Neva
By Jessica Conditt
I’m not the most involved player, but I love learning games from Jess. Recently, he reviewed a science fiction mystery Phoenix Springs and a dreamy platform game Nevawith pieces so beautifully written that I can’t help but check out each title to get a feel for how he feels about them. Phoenix Springs even follows a tech reporter and covers my favorite genres (sci-fi and mystery), while Neva’s art just looks gorgeous. I don’t know yet if I’ll find time to play the new games, but these two are definitely added to my list.
Future reviews: On the horizon
The Engadget team thinks about a lot of things, and when we start writing this holiday gift guide, we think about the products we like for ourselves and our loved ones. Most of us love e-readers and writing tablets. I certainly have my eye on one of the new Kindles announced this week, in particular the new Kindle Scribe and maybe Colorsoft. These won’t be available until later this year, so for now I’ll continue to look eagerly at the reMarkable Paper Pro. I’ll also be interested to see if Amazon’s chief operating officer, Panos Panay, has anything but Diet Coke up his sleeve—which I learned he (like many people) enjoyed when I had the chance to chat with him. interview this week.
Many of us are millennials and have a huge soft spot for retro gaming. Our executive editor, Aaron Souppouris, spoke with the folks at Analogue, and you can read his beautifully constructed piece. the upcoming Analogue 3D.
Apple kind of surprised us this week announces the new iPad miniIt has been modified to offer more memory and power with the A17 Pro processor. It will, of course, support Apple Intelligence, and while it may seem like a minor upgrade, some of my colleagues and I still love the idea of a small tablet. Wish it had a better screen.
All of the recently announced ones are on our review list, along with things like the Google TV Streamer and the Samsung Galaxy S24 FE launched in the last few weeks. As we approach November and all the holiday shopping that brings, hopefully the hardware is properly slowing down. We’re still waiting for Apple’s event for Macs, and we can remember being surprised by the announcement of Humane’s AI Pin late last year. But for now, we’re basking in nostalgia and longing for a simpler time.
