Lead Hacker

Apple’s Home Collection is part of the company’s first major push into the smart home category. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge For more than a decade, Apple has told other companies to build smart home devices for its platform. This week, Apple launched its own . The Apple Home Collection is a lineup of cameras, thermostats, sensors, a smart door lock, and a video doorbell, all codeveloped with LG Electronics and Schneider Electric. They arrive alongside HomeView , Apple's first smart display. Even after 12 years of HomeKit, Apple's smart home ecosystem still feels underdeveloped, especially compared to the competition. Amazon's and Google's ecosystems support more products, and both have popular in-house brands: Ring and Nest. Apple had nothing of its own to point c … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/tech/1013025/apple-home-collection-products-lg-schneider-smart-home

The new Apple TV 4K will be available in November. | Image: The Verge Earlier this week, Apple announced its new Apple TV 4K , which costs nearly twice as much as the 2022 model did at launch. Amazon is now offering the first discount on the forthcoming streaming box (coming out on November 13th), just days after discounting Apple’s new smart display for the first time. Right now, you can preorder the latest Apple TV 4K ahead of its November 13th release date for $289.99 ($9 off) at Amazon . Yes, it’s a tiny discount, but every little bit helps given the higher price tag. Apple TV 4K (2026) Where to Buy: $299 $289.99 at Amazon Powered by the new A19 chip, Apple’s latest streaming device now features support for Siri AI out of the box, which is coming to older Apple TV 4K models via a software update. Unlike its predecessors, though, the new model features far-field microphones so you can quickly make hands-free requests. You can, for example, ask ...

If you missed out on Prime Day’s headphones deals, you’re in luck. Sony’s latest flagship headphones are selling for even less than they did during Amazon’s big fall sale. As part of B&H Photo’s Deals of the Day , you can currently pick up Sony’s WH-1000XM6 noise-canceling headphones in silver for just $328 at checkout ($130 off) for the rest of the day. That’s one of the best prices we’ve seen, and much cheaper than what you’ll typically pay at major retailers like Amazon and Best Buy, even during seasonal sales. Sony WH-1000XM6 Where to Buy: $458 $328 at B&H Photo The WH-1000XM6 are Sony’s best over-ear headphones yet, thanks in part to a new chip, which Sony says delivers the most powerful active noise cancellation in the series. Unsurprisingly, they also deliver the best sound of any WH-1000XM-series headphones to date, with new drivers that produce clearer vocals and richer bass. They’re great for work and life...

An Nvidia RTX Spark chip aboard an Asus laptop motherboard. | Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge Fourteen years ago this month, Microsoft released an Nvidia-powered Windows PC that would become one of the greatest tech flops in modern history. The original Microsoft Surface, which ran a stripped-down version of Windows on an Nvidia Tegra chip, bombed so hard that Microsoft had to write off $900 million in inventory . The problem was that Nvidia's Arm chip couldn't run existing Windows apps. Buyers had to leave their legacy programs behind. This Friday, October 16th, Nvidia will once again be at the heart of Arm-powered Windows PCs with the first wave of RTX Spark laptops. But now, the company says, they'll run everything . Adobe. Offic … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/tech/1011705/nvidia-rtx-spark-everything-runs-on-arm

Begone, Bot. | Image: Google / Android Android is introducing new scam defense features that aim to make it easier for users to evade mobile fraud, including bolstered protection in Google Messages and additional safeguarding tools. Building on the Scam Detection feature in Google Messages, a new "enhanced protection" setting will be rolling out in the coming weeks that taps into cloud-based Gemini AI models to quickly evaluate a potential scammer's intentions in conversations with an unrecognized sender. "Scammers often disguise their true motives behind slow-burn conversations," Google said in its update announcement . "This secure cloud analysis augments and extends our existi … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/tech/1010928/android-scam-protection-enhanced-protection-google-messages

After months sitting on the sidelines of the frontier AI race, Google has finally launched its long-awaited Gemini 4 Argon model, claiming it can compete with the best the industry has to offer. Google says Argon delivers "frontier reasoning and improved performance across complex workflows," while cutting down on hedging, repetition, and the cliches that continue to plague AI chatbots. The company claims Argon outperforms rival models like GPT-6 Astra, Claude Fable 5.1, and Claude Opus 5.5 across a range of benchmarks, including coding, cybersecurity, science, finance, and law. Google says it's already putting Argon to use internally, s … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1009862/google-releases-gemini-4-argon