Strap on some smartwatch brains. Montblanc Luxury accessories maker Montblanc is known for supplying high-end old-school supplies like $1,000 fountain pens, leather briefcases and mechanical watches marked with “price available upon request.” It’s not exactly the sort of company you expect to throw its hat into the ring with the likes of Samsung, Apple and …

Looking at the dizzying pace of announcements, acquisitions and new initiatives, you could be forgiven for wondering when Facebook employees will sit back and take a break. Quite the contrary, one of the mottoes floating around the company’s Menlo Park, Calif., offices is that Facebook is only 1 percent through its “journey.” The company has already begun laying the groundwork …

One smart ring to rule them all. Video screenshot by Amanda Kooser/CNET Kevin Bates likes to shrink things. The maker of the Arduboy interactive business card already created a miniscule playable Tetris game. Now he’s turned his attention toward the most dainty of wearables: the smart ring. The Ö ring is a Bluetooth smart ring sporting a tiny 64×32 monochrome …

It’s a brand new year, so why not start it off right by ditching the shackles of old habits and trying some new things to make your tech life easier? We know that old habits die hard and that’s why we’ve also included links to show you how to handle these common practices 1. Using the same passwords for multiple …

Samsung showed off a prototype Tizen TV at the 2014 Tizen Developer Conference in San Francisco. The company says all its 2015 smart TVs will run the OS. Nate Ralph/CNET Samsung’s Tizen operating system will power all the company’s smart TVs in 2015, the Korean electronics maker announced Wednesday, another step in Samsung’s efforts to gain a foothold for the …

Let me just dispel any notions that in the space of one year we’re going to get a better sounding music format, the end to the Loudness Wars, or a decent sounding Bluetooth speaker. I’m thinking about things that might actually happen, not fantasy stuff. First on my wish list: Apple turns the key and offers bona fide high-resolution iTunes, …

Wearable tech is dedicated to staying on your wrist, but its face is changing fast. Headed into 2015, the wearable market will soon be bidding a slow farewell to the dominance of screen- and app-less fitness wristbands and trackers, like the Fitbit Flex and Jawbone UP, and welcoming in the era of smartwatches, with the Apple Watch front and center. …

Sony expands distribution of “The Interview,” the movie that spurred hackers to attack the studio’s network. Sony Pictures The release of “The Interview,” the Sony Pictures movie that sparked a devastating cyberattack and an international uproar, is now spreading well beyond its initial limited scope. The studio announced Wednesday that it’s expanding the movie’s distribution to the In Demand pay-per-view …

So. Much. Fun. DJI Well, cheeps, here we are at the end of another year. Let me take this opportunity to thank you for your amazing support and kind words (many of you have written the nicest things, truly), and to wish you a safe, happy, healthy and prosperous 2015. Be safe, be kind, be well. Before we move forward, …

Huawei smartphones, like the Ascend Mate 7 seen here, are a rarity in the US. CNET Huawei Technologies continues to be an up-and-comer in the smartphone world. In 2014, smartphone revenue for the Chinese telecommunications company rose by nearly one-third to $11.8 billion, according to both Reuters and The Wall Street Journal, each citing an internal staff memo. The memo, …

Enlarge ImageSamsung will be counting on sales in emerging regions — such as this Buenos Aires, Argentina, store — to boost its results in 2015. Shara Tibken/CNET Samsung has long had Apple in its crosshairs, but that rivalry won’t be its main concern in 2015. The primary target for the South Korean electronics conglomerate in the coming year will be …

So what’s better: home-theater-in-a-box (HTiB) systems or sound bars? The latter are markedly better than they were just a few years ago, but the inherent design compromises of single-speaker systems have, so far, proved insurmountable. Sound bars can’t fill a room as well as five speakers can. It wasn’t that long ago I was reviewing a bunch of HTiBs every …

Gmail is starting to see life again in China. Google’s e-mail service has seen a slight uptick in traffic going into the country, according to the company’s Transparency Report. The Financial Times (subscription required) was the first to notice that access had returned. The increase hints at the end of a four-day outage in China, one with no explanation. Greatfire.org, …

FreedomPop I’ve always felt that the pain of owning a smartphone isn’t the cost of the phone itself, but rather the monthly fee you have to pay to use it. Even if you go with a low-cost carrier, you’re still probably looking at anywhere from $20-40 per month. Not today. Today only, and while supplies last, Yugster has the refurbished …

Samsung wants to jump-start the virtual-reality movement. The Korean electronics conglomerate on Tuesday launched Milk VR, a service that will provide free 360-degree videos to anyone using a Gear VR virtual-reality headset, which launched as a limited earlier this month. The content is expected to dribble out on a consistent basis in an effort to get people coming back to …