Samsung’s latest ad campaign for the Galaxy S9 is poking Apple where it hurts — right in the dongle.  (In other words, they’re making fun of the extra adapters and cables that Apple users increasingly need to access “legacy” devices like wired headphones, SD card slots and other cables.) While the ad is definitely a …

It’s no secret that Google has been quietly working on Fuchsia, a new experimental OS for tablets and phones. Here’s the secret, according to a Bloomberg report Thursday: Fuchsia could replace Android and Chrome OS within the next five years.  Mind you, that’s just the ambition, according to the report — and Google disputes that specific part; CNET understands there’s …

It’s becoming clearer every day — the 2018 MacBook Pro “butterfly switch” keyboard was designed to resist dust and debris, and thus avoid the sticky key issue that sometimes plagued its predecessor.  Why would we say that, when Apple explicitly told us that the keyboard wouldn’t include any dust/debris fixes? For one thing, MacRumors reports that Apple is telling its own Canadian …

I really wish Amazon’s new Part Finder worked better, because it’s a great idea in theory — just take a picture of that oddball screw, with the Amazon Shopping app (on iOS) and it’ll theoretically show you a matching fastener you can order on the spot. But when I tried it today: I had to go get a white piece …

There’s a new MacBook Pro keyboard in town, one which Apple merely says is quieter, but also presumably protects against damage from dust. But if your MacBook Pro gets damaged by dust and you opt for the free repair program, you won’t get the new quieter third-gen “butterfly switch” keyboard — but rather a replacement for your original second-gen model. …

When big companies buy tiny, beloved products like Instapaper, there’s always a fear they’ll get unceremoniously killed off. Particularly when a new privacy law (GDPR) makes it tempting for companies to destroy things rather than spend money updating them. But Instapaper isn’t getting the ax — after two years under its owner Pinterest, the bookmark-and-read-it-later app is going indie, and …

It’s one of the worst-kept secrets in the phone industry: Samsung is hoping to eventually sell you a phone with a fingerprint sensor that lives underneath the screen. But how? Well, a pair of reports out of China and Korea suggest that sucker might be ultrasonic — firing high-frequency acoustic waves through the glass that capture your fingerprint without fear of …

At $700, the Essential Phone didn’t make sense. At $500, it was worth a look, for the right person. But today, for Amazon Prime Day, the Essential Phone is just $250 — and that’s an incredible deal. See the Essential Phone at Amazon ($250) We’re talking about a phone with issues, yes — read my five-months-later-review — but also an unlocked …

ZTE is finally, officially free of the crippling US ban that threatened to sink the entire Chinese telecom company. It’s been a long, painstaking process, but the US Department of Commerce announced Friday that the company has deposited the final $400 million in an escrow account — and so the ban is lifted. That $400 million, which will be held …

You know those iPad ads where some young whippersnapper asks, “What’s a computer?” as if the PC is long dead? According to market research firm Gartner, the death of PC sales hasn’t yet come to pass. According to market research firms Gartner and IDC, worldwide PC shipments just grew for the first time in six years. Gartner and IDC’s numbers …