Would you like to use Apple’s stylus with your iPad? That is one of the planned software updates that will accompany hardware improvements already in development, sources tell Bloomberg. The updated iPad software, which is designed to cater to the needs of professionals, is expected to ship in 2017, the unidentified sources told the news …

Funko has a talent for transforming favorite pop culture characters into cute collectibles. With the buzz about sci-fi/horror Netflix series “Stranger Things” at an all-time high, it was only a matter of time before the toy company put out feelers to gauge the response to potential Pop Vinyl figures of the show’s most popular characters. Related stories This Eleven figure …

Now playing: Watch this: Apple Music gets a boost before iPhone 7 launch 2:09 You’ve read all the rumors about Apple’s next iPhone, which may or may not be called the iPhone 7 and may or may not be the handset you’ve been pining for. But wonder no more. You can find out for yourself September 7 when the tech …

We get it. Dropping brand new, expensive gadgets to see if they’ll break under extreme conditions is fun. Not only do plenty of YouTubers dedicate full video channels to dropping smartphones, tablets and other electronic devices to test their durability, we did the same thing here at CNET last week with Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7. Related stories Drop test: Is …

The Fitbit Blaze is getting an update. Fitbit announced on Monday that its fitness smartwatch will soon receive an update that enables third-party notifications and other new features. The Blaze, which costs $200 in the US (£160 in the UK and AU$330 in Australia), was released earlier this year. The watch can track steps, distance, calories burned, active minutes and …

They’ve been a fixture of the computing industry for 60 years, but in 2018, hard drives will be pushed aside by storage systems using memory chips in PCs, an analyst firm predicts. Hard drives revolutionized computing when IBM commercialized the first, RAMAC, in 1956. They read and write ones and zeros as tiny patches of magnetic information on rotating platters. …

A US appeals court on Monday dismissed the FTC’s suit against AT&T that charged the company deceived its unlimited-data customers when it slowed their connection speeds. The Federal Trade Commission had accused the company of failing to deliver on its promise of “unlimited data,” saying it violated the FTC Act. “The issue here is simple: ‘unlimited’ means unlimited,” FTC Chairwoman …

While we have yet to harness the technology to jump from this solar system to another in a matter of seconds, that doesn’t mean fans can’t build a full-size replica of a Stargate. A team from Vigo Universal, a company that specializes in new technologies, joined forces with Belgium’s Musée royal de Mariemont to recreate the giant ring-like portal from …

Hammer time! The Slow Mo Guys on YouTube decided to damn the “break a mirror, get seven years of bad luck” superstition and intentionally smash their way through a looking glass. But instead of finding Alice’s Wonderland, they ended up in Neo’s Matrix. Related stories What goes up, must come down: Domino tower gives it up to gravity Watch bowling …

I’ve been reviewing laptops for more than a decade, but the very first device that we’d consider a true laptop dates back much further. There were a small handful of technically portable computers before it, often called “luggables,” but the first PC we’d recognize as having a readable display, a built-in keyboard and a clamshell-style hinge was the Grid Compass, …

Over the last few months I’ve written about the persistent rumors that Apple will remove the headphone jack on the next iPhone. Every time I write about it, readers’ comments have been generally negative, with some folks threatening to boycott the iPhone when Apple drops the headphone jack. Well, from all indications, including published reports citing “people familiar with the …

Big-screen Batman Ben Affleck surprised comic fans this morning with 27 seconds of tweeted video that appear to show a new DC cinematic universe character: Deathstroke. The assassin for hire has been a cult favorite since he was introduced back in 1980 (and was originally called “The Terminator” before a certain James Cameron film became strongly identified with that name). …

Apple is being sued by owners of Apple’s iPhone 6 and 6 Plus phones, over unresponsive touchscreens, reported Reuters on Monday. The issue, first widely reported by tech site iFixit, is said to affect last-generation iPhones and manifests itself as “a gray, flickering bar at the top of the display and an unresponsive touchscreen.” The iFixit report says: “Of course, …

The two big names in contactless payments are slowly making their way into the Australian market, with ANZ today announcing that it will extend support for Apple Pay and Android Pay to customers with an ANZ-issued MasterCard. From today, the 500,000-plus ANZ customers with a MasterCard will be able to use Apple Pay on their iPhone or Android Pay on …

Fans who love to dress up as their favorite film, TV, comic book and video game characters don’t just reside in the United States. Our Eastern European friends reminded us of this at Starcon in St. Petersburg, Russia, where cosplayers donned their DIY costumes and strutted their stuff. In two videos, Starcon Старкон 2016 Russian Cosplay Part 1 and Part …