FUNKY GREEN: 03/21/20

Saturday 21 March 2020

What is Tidal? The hi-fi streaming music service fully explained

If you're in search of the highest quality of streaming music available, you need to look at Jay-Z's Tidal.

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Best Buy 3-Day Sale: Up to 55% off iPad, Beats Studio 3, MacBook Air, and more

Best Buy's 3-Day Sale features up to 55% off the iPad Mini, Beats Studio 3, 55-inch Samsung NU6900 4K TV, Acer Chromebook 15, and MacBook Air.

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The best budget laptops for 2020

Looking for a budget notebook for school, work, or play? The best budget laptops, including our top pick -- the Asus ZenBook UX333 -- will get the job done without digging too deeply into your pockets.

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Global smartphone market sees biggest decline in history last month

The smartphone market just saw its biggest decline in history.

What you need to know

Global smartphone shipments saw their steepest decline in history last month.
Shipments dropped 38 percent in February 2020.
COVID-19 and its impact on manufacturing and shopping habits is to blame.

Apple had adjusted its expected performance for this quarter back in February, saying that the company would not hit its initial estimates due to the coronavirus pandemic. Now, Strategy Analytics has released a new report starting to shed some light on how much of a hit the smartphone market took. According to Neil Mawston, Executive Director at Strategy Analytics, the market saw its sharpest decline ever in February.

"February 2020 saw the biggest fall ever in the history of the worldwide smartphone market. Supply and demand of smartphones plunged in China, slumped across Asia, and slowed in the rest of the world. It is a period the smartphone industry will want to forget."

Linda Sui, Director at Strategy Analytics, revealed that the smartphone market dropped 38 percent annually when comparing February 2019 to 2020. Sui attributes this drop to COVID-19 and factory's inability to manufacture devices as well as consumers being unable or hesitant to buy them.

"Global smartphone shipments tumbled a huge 38 percent annually from 99.2 million units in the month of February, 2019, to 61.8 million in February, 2020. Smartphone demand collapsed in Asia last month, due to the Covid-19 outbreak, and this dragged down shipments across the world. Some Asian factories were unable to manufacture smartphones, while many consumers were unable or unwilling to visit retail stores and buy new devices."

Yiwen Wu, Senior Analyst at Strategy Analytics, says that he does not expect much to improve in March, and that the industry will have to get creative with discounts and bundles in order to boost sales.

"Despite tentative signs of recovery in China, we expect global smartphone shipments overall to remain weak throughout March, 2020. The coronavirus scare has spread to Europe, North America and elsewhere, and hundreds of millions of affluent consumers are in lockdown, unable or unwilling to shop for new devices. The smartphone industry will have to work harder than ever to lift sales in the coming weeks, such as online flash sales or generous discounts on bundling with hot products like smartwatches."

The report did not break down as to how each individual smartphone brand performed in February, so it is currently unclear how much the iPhone was impacted by this drop in shipments.

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Apple TV+ joins Netflix in reducing European streaming quality

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William Duvall performs Til the Light Guides Me Home video - CNET

Alice In Chains frontman William DuVall plays Til the Light Guides Me Home live in the CNET Smart Home.

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Coronavirus: How to track the virus spread across the world as cases top 270,000 - CNET

An online dashboard shows all confirmed, suspected and recovered coronavirus patients, as well as deaths.

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William DuVall plays White Hot from One Alone album video - CNET

William DuVall from Alice In Chains performs White Hot live in the CNET Smart Home.

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Google sibling Verily: Coronavirus website has led to over 130 tests so far - CNET

For now, the website is limited to testing only in the San Francisco Bay Area.

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Trump’s Embrace of Unproven Drugs to Treat Coronavirus Defies Science

Doctors and patients also worry that the president’s rosy outlook for the treatments will exacerbate shortages of old malaria drugs relied on by patients with lupus and other debilitating conditions.

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So You Bought Someone a Gadget. Here’s How Not to Become Their Tech Support.

It feels like the easiest gift until it needs a reboot, restart or anything else.

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DOJ says it will prioritize the prosecution of coronavirus crimes

Attorney General William P. Barr urged the American public to report all cases of COVID-19 scams and fraud.

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Xbox Live is down for the second time this week

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Microsoft’s Xbox Live service is down again for the second time this week. Issues first began popping up some time after 7PM ET on Friday, with Down Detector indicating sharp spikes in user-reported connection problems and Microsoft later confirming Twitter that it’s “experiencing issues” with matchmaking, Party Chat, and Looking for Groups.”

On Sunday, Xbox Live experienced a similar outage that lasted more than two hours. That was slightly more serious, with users reporting issues signing into Xbox One devices. This time around, Microsoft’s Xbox Live Status page doesn’t seem to be indicating any problems yet, although the company is acknowledging that it’s working on a fix.

We are aware that users are experiencing issues with...

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The best web browsers for 2020

Choosing a web browser for surfing the web can be tough with all the great options available. Here we pit the latest versions of Chrome, Opera, Firefox, and Edge against one another to find the best browsers for most users.

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Keep your hands warm and toasty on the slopes in 2020 with the best ski gloves

We've rounded up the best ski gloves available, all of which keep you warm and dry and on the hill longer.

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Apple TV+ lowers streaming quality in Europe as networks strain to keep up

Apple TV+ is getting a minus.

What you need to know

Apple TV+ has cut its streaming quality in Europe.
Netflix and Amazon Prime have also lowered the quality of their streams.
The picture quality on Apple TV+ now appears to be lower than HD.

One of the best parts of Apple TV+ is that you get impressive streaming quality for the same price as other users. Whereas Netflix currently charges a premium on its monthly bill in order to get content in 4K, 4K HDR content is included in your $4.99 per month Apple TV+ subscription.

Unfortunately for Apple TV+ customers in Europe, that high-quality bitrate streaming is going to go away for a period of time. Reported by 9to5Mac, European officials have asked streaming services to lower the bandwidth that their services use in order to help keep their networks up and running.

As more and more people isolate to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus, they are understandably watching a lot more streaming content. In order to help handle the strain that is being put on networks to keep up with the uptick in viewers, Netflix, Apple TV+, Amazon Prime, and others are lowering the quality of their content.

Apple is reportedly cutting the quality of its content all the way from 4K down to 670 pixels tall. On top of the stream now changed to a lower resolution, they also appear to be highly compressed which creates a pixelated look to the image. The move appears even more aggressive than Netflix and Amazon Prime, who are reportedly still streaming in HD.

Apple could up the quality of its streams to match that of its rivals, but it is unclear if that will happen. Thankfully, Apple TV+ users, unlike their Netflix counterparts, are not paying a higher price for a stream quality they are not currently receiving.

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Money really does grow on trees in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Bells make the Animal Crossing world go round.

When you first start off on your deserted island all you have is a tent, a cot, a radio, a lamp, and a NookPhone. There aren't any buildings or any easy paths to get you to the far reaches of your island. If you're wanting to turn this beautiful location into the perfect tropical getaway, you're gonna need plenty of Bells. Fortunately, in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, money does grow on trees and there are several quick ways to enlarge your wallet. Here are some tips for earning tons of Bells really quickly.

Go the extra mile

As part of the Nook Getaway Package, players are able to repay their loan with Nook Miles as well as with Bells. Fortunately, it's really easy to earn Nook Miles tickets, especially at the start of the game. There are a lot of simple tasks like taking a photo, writing on the board, or putting something in your house, that will help you earn Nook Miles and get you closer to paying off your loan.

Weed the island

When you first start out, your island will be covered in weeds. Fortunately, cleaning them up will actually get you a decent amount of money. Run to Resident Services and talk to Timmy. He'll give you 990 Bells for every 99 weeds you pull.

Simply smashing

You'll find plenty of rocks around your island. If you use a shovel or axe to wack at them, you might get rewarded with Bells, bugs, or precious stones. You can immediately pocket the Bells, but you'll want to run to Resident Services in order to sell any rare stones or bugs you discover.

Shake it like a polaroid picture

In addition to fruit, you'll find that there are coins and items hidden in the trees around your island. Simply go up to the trunk and press the A button on your Switch and then your character will shake a tree lodging anything in the treetops loose. If you're lucky, something rare will fall out. If nothing else, you can always gather up all of those fruits and sell them at Resident Services.

Gotta catch 'em all!

There are plenty of bugs inhabiting your island. As in real life, some of them only appear at night. Take the opportunity to run around and catch as many bugs as possible. You can get a decent amount of Bells when you sell them.

Butterflies are definitely the easiest to catch, but don't give you as much money. But every little bit helps. To really make some cash, you'll need to be more careful and sneak up on the other insects that are quick to run away. Just be careful around wasps, scorpions, and spiders as these creepy crawlies can hurt you.

Catch of the day

You'll find plenty of fish swimming around your island, whether it's in the ocean or in one of the rivers. If you happen to catch one of the rarer fish, you can really turn a profit from it when you go to sell. Spend some time fishing every day and see if you get lucky. If nothing else, all the money you earn from catching more common fish can quickly add up.

Money does grow on trees

If during the course of running around your island, you happen to come across a glimmering spot of ground. Use your shovel to dig in that spot and you will find 1,000 Bells. While you can always just pocket the money, you can get way more if you're patient.

Select the bag of Bells from your inventory and choose to bury it back into the ground. Note, that you can bury up to 10,000 Bells in one of these special holes. Upon burying the bag, a sapling will appear. Leave the sapling alone for several days.

Eventually it will grow into a tree and drop three Bell bags. Note that a new money tree glimmer spot appears on your island every day. You can have multiple money trees growing at one time so you'll definitely want to be on the lookout for these shining spots.

Ring in the Bells!

At it's core, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is all about earning money to pay of your loan and build your perfect life. There are plenty of things you can do to quickly earn Nook Miles or Bells as you go about your island. Good luck crafting the perfect getaway. I hope you're able to find the rarest creatures and build the home of your dreams.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

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Satechi's Backlit Keyboard is one of my new favorite desk accessories

A good keyboard can make or break your productivity throughout the day.

I've been working from home for about five years now, and a large portion of that time was spent on the iMac that sat on my desk until just a few months ago, when I sold it in favor of a laptop-and-monitor setup. I stuck with mostly first-party peripherals with my iMac — save for the miserable Magic Mouse that I quickly swapped for a Logitech MX Master — which means I'm no stranger to Apple's Magic Keyboard 2.

It's a great keyboard, with similar key travel to older MacBook Pro models, a minimal design, and a small footprint. But that small footprint meant that there was no number pad — Apple eventually released a wider variant of the Magic Keyboard that reintroduced the number pad — and equally frustrating, the keyboard recharges over Apple's proprietary Lightning connector rather than the more ubiquitous USB-C.

That's where Satechi's Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard comes in. Donning the same Space Gray finish as the MacBook Pro I've got it connected to, and a similar chiclet design for its keys, it's clear Satechi took considerable inspiration from Apple's own keyboards, but if you ask me, it's improved upon the Magic Keyboard's design in nearly every appreciable way.

Write comfortably for longer

Satechi Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard

$80 at Amazon

The keyboard Apple should've made

Satechi's Bluetooth keyboard has great key travel, convenient backlighting, and a handy number pad, and it charges over USB-C. Best of all, it can pair to up to three devices and quickly switch between them with the press of a button.

For starters, the Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard is about as good-looking and well-built as a keyboard gets. It's made entirely of aluminum, with shiny chamfered edges that take me back to the HTC 10, which continues to be one my favorite smartphone designs of all time. It feels incredibly sturdy, with no give or creaking even if you try to flex the hardware.

It's also incredibly slim, with a tapered design that raises the upper keys to be a bit easier on your wrists, though if even that's not enough, Satechi includes some thicker rubber feet in the box to make the function row even taller. The keyboard layout closely matches that of Apple's Magic Keyboard 2, with all of the same Mac-centric iconography and F-row functions.

You'd be forgiven for mistaking this keyboard for Apple's own Magic Keyboard with Numeric Pad, though Satechi's offering is a bit narrower because it retains the compact arrow key layout of the smaller Magic Keyboard 2, rather than the former's inverted-T layout. This didn't bother me since I'm used to the compact design, but some may find it too cramped or difficult to find the up and down keys by feel.

Satechi's keyboard improves on Apple's design in nearly every appreciable way.

As far as typing on the keyboard goes, it's extremely comfortable for me, coming from the butterfly switches of my 2018 MacBook Pro — which l also genuinely enjoy typing on, despite its notorious reliability issues. Key travel is comparable to the Magic Keyboard 2, albeit a bit less mushy. Each keycap recesses a bit towards the center, with a circular divot that feels great under my fingers.

It's also much quieter than the keyboard on my MacBook; if you're looking for a loud, clackety mechanical keyboard with deep key travel, this isn't it, but it's exactly what I want when I'm typing for hours on end every day. The number pad, while not unique to Satechi by any means, is enormously handy for data input, but the buttons above it are even more helpful.

One of this keyboard's biggest advantages over Apple's own offerings is its ability to pair to up to three devices at once. You can press and hold any of the three Bluetooth buttons for a few seconds to enter pairing mode, then quickly switch between devices using the same buttons once paired.

It doesn't just work for Mac devices, of course; you can pair this keyboard to Windows machines, Chromebooks, iPhones, iPads, or even Android phones. I generally have my S20+ sitting vertically on a wireless charging pad while I'm at my desk, and I love being able to quickly switch over to reply to a text without having to pick up the phone and break my workflow.

Of course, another huge perk of this keyboard is right in the name: it's backlit. I'm not generally a fan of working in the dark, but for long work nights or hangover recovery days when you just can't stand overhead lighting (I'm not judging, it happens to the best of us), it's a great feature to have. You can cycle through ten levels of brightness, and you can quickly move from off to full brightness by tapping F5.

USB-C is great; why can't all keyboards use it?

Of course, running the backlight at full brightness will take a toll on battery life, but that just brings me to my other favorite feature of Satechi's keyboard, the USB-C port on the back. It's weirdly off-center, both on the x- and y-axes, but the functionality is the same. When the keyboard's battery runs dry (typically after about a week of heavy use), I can top it back up with the same cable I use to charge my phone, laptop, headphones — you get the idea. USB-C is great, and so is this keyboard.

I'm a sucker for great build quality and clean, minimal aesthetics, and Satechi's Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard nails all of it. This is the keyboard Apple should be including with its desktop computers if you ask me, and I only wish Satechi would make a similar Magic Trackpad competitor with USB-C.

Satechi Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard

$80 at Amazon

Satechi's Bluetooth keyboard is optimized for Mac and iOS devices, but it works great with virtually any machine — even Android phones. It supports up to three paired devices at once, with quick and easy switching.

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Saturday 21 March 2020

What you need to know

What you need to know

Go the extra mile

Weed the island

Simply smashing

Shake it like a polaroid picture

Gotta catch 'em all!

Catch of the day

Money does grow on trees

Ring in the Bells!

Get More Switch

Nintendo Switch

Write comfortably for longer

Satechi Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard

Satechi Compact Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard

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