Technology

Lenovo’s Ideapad Flex 3 Chromebook is one of the tiniest Chromebooks I’ve ever used. It’s also one of the cheapest, retailing for just $349.99. Any laptop that costs that little is going to have some serious drawbacks — and the Flex 3 certainly does. On the other hand, if you’re the sort of shopper who’s willing to set those aside, this little IdeaPad also has a number of pleasant surprises up its sleeve. There are even a few areas (in particular, the battery life) where it gives significantly more expensive devices a run for their money. Verge Score 7 out of 10 Good Stuff Excellent battery life Good keyboard Modern port selection Chassis feels sturdy Bad Stuff Bad screen Ugly and dated design Weak processor I’ll start with the pleasant surprises. The Flex 3 offers a more modern port selec...

A SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft with four astronauts aboard successfully docked with the International Space Station early Saturday to start its six-month mission, NASA announced. Crew-2, as it’s been dubbed, is SpaceX’s third astronaut mission under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. It brings NASA’s Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, Akihiko Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and Thomas Pesquet, a French aerospace engineer from the European Space Agency (ESA) to the ISS, which travels at more than 17,000 miles per hour in orbit roughly 250 miles above Earth. A Falcon 9 rocket which was used for SpaceX’s Crew-1 mission in 2020, launched early Friday for its 24-hour trip to the ISS. The Falcon 9 carried Endeavour, the same Crew Dragon capsule that launched SpaceX’s debu...

It’s the weekend, so that’s our cue to fire off this handy list of the best tech deals we’ve laid eyes on over the past few days. There weren’t many big surprise price drops, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t some great pieces of tech to buy. This week’s best deals are for people trying to stretch their dollar as far as possible. There’s a discount on a feature-packed soundbar for under $100, and Google’s Pixel 3 that has a solid camera is just $170. Plus, there are some more gaming deals below. Have a nice weekend! Save on this capable yet affordable TCL soundbar TCL might be known more for its TVs than soundbars, but we still think this deal from Woot is worth sharing. The TCL Alto 8 Plus, which has both a subwoofer and Amazon’s Fire TV 4K streaming hardware built in, is just $70 new a...

The United States should resume use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine for all adults, an independent advisory committee to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today. There is a small risk of a rare type of blood clot in women under 50, and health officials should warn patients of that risk, the committee stressed during its deliberations. Federal officials at the CDC and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) could lift the pause on the shot based on that recommendation soon — within hours or days. The FDA will likely add a warning label to the vaccine about the blood clots. Federal officials at the CDC and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) could lift the pause on the shot based on that recommendation soon Use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine has been pau...

How much would someone pay for the digital rights to an autographed copy of a selfie — featuring talk show host Ellen DeGeneres and a crude stick-figure drawing of a cat? We’ll soon find out — because Ellen is about to drop her very own NFTs next week, as first reported by Variety, quite possibly making her the most mainstream celeb to cash in on the craze yet. The “Woman With Stick Cat” selfie will be one of them, as will her video monologue itself (in 4K resolution). The auction will start 9am PT on Monday, April 26th at Bitski.com/ellen. Never fear, feline lovers: you’ll be able to get a high-res digital copy of “Woman With Stick Cat” in the auction as well, either by bidding on one of the 10 “rare” copies, an unlimited number of not-rare copies — or, no doubt, by right-clicking or long...

A fourth Captain America movie is on the way, set to be co-written by Malcolm Spellman, the creator, showrunner, and head writer of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (which just aired its season finale on Disney Plus on Friday). Dalan Musson, a staff writer on the series, will also co-write the upcoming film, according to reports from The Hollywood Reporter and Deadline. Spoilers for the season finale of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier ahead Details on the upcoming film, including a director, cast, and a release date, have yet to be officially announced by Disney. But both reports note that the upcoming film will likely follow up on the finale of the Disney Plus series, which saw Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson take up the shield and title of the new Captain America. The involvement of Spell...

Adidas has designed a pair of Stan Smith sneakers that could be perfect for the Star Wars fan in your life who also pulls double-duty as a hypebeast. The Yoda version of the Stan Smith, Forever sneakers features a design inspired by the famous green alien, with quotes and illustrations. Adidas says the shoes will go on sale right after Star Wars Day, on May 5th, for $120. The Stan Smith, Forever line is named after American tennis player Stan Smith, with “Forever” standing for the shoe’s environmentally friendly bent due to its use of “Primegreen” fabric. Adidas claims Primegreen is made from 50 percent recycled materials. The Yoda version is also green in another way, of course. The back heels of the shoes have Yoda’s face embossed in green fabric, and the tongues of both shoes feature il...

Oculus is turning on its Air Link PC streaming feature for the Quest 2 virtual reality headset. Air Link is part of the Oculus v28 software update, which recently started rolling out to Oculus headset owners. Facebook Reality Labs head Andrew Bosworth says you can find the feature if you’re running v28 on your PC and Quest 2 headset; if you haven’t gotten access to the update yet, “it’s coming very soon.” Air Link lets Quest 2 owners with a strong Wi-Fi connection play PC VR games wirelessly on their headsets. Air Link was initially disabled on v28. But as Upload points out, Quest 2 owners had found a way to unofficially turn it on, and Oculus had warned that the experience was “not representative” of the final result. Bosworth says Oculus is releasing the feature today because “the excite...

For the past 20 years UK Post Office employees have been dealing with a piece of software called Horizon, which had a fatal flaw: bugs that made it look like employees stole tens of thousands of British pounds. This led to some local postmasters being convicted of crimes, even being sent to prison, because the Post Office doggedly insisted the software could be trusted. After fighting for decades, 39 people are finally having their convictions overturned, after what is reportedly the largest miscarriage of justice that the UK has ever seen. The impact on these employees has been vast: according to the BBC, some have lost marriages or time with their children. Talking to the BBC, Janet Skinner said that she was taken away from her two kids for nine months when she was imprisoned, after the ...

Federal officials said that the United States should resume use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine, which has been on pause since April 13th. The company updated the fact sheets about the vaccine for doctors and patients to include information about the risks of clots. Vaccinations with the Johnson & Johnson shot could start back up as soon as tomorrow morning, said Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, during a press briefing. The decision to reinstate the J&J vaccine follows the recommendation of an independent CDC advisory group earlier today. The committee stressed that officials should make people aware of the risk of rare blood clots, which appear most often in women under 50. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Cen...

Google probably wasn’t planning to reveal this until the company’s I/O developer conference on May 18th, but it looks like a cat may be out of the bag: the company’s testing a feature that should let you stop alarms and answer calls on your Android phone simply by saying “stop” — no need to pick up your phone or even say “Hey Google.” We know this because a mysterious new setting called “Guacamole” has popped up in the Google app on Android 11 for some users — including me. (Android Police and 9to5Google tipped us off.) And while none of us journalists have been able to actually turn on the feature yet, it’s fairly easy to imagine what it does. The menus where Guacamole can be found, for some users running Android 11 and Google app version 12.15.9.29. If you’d rather not imagine, 9to5Googl...

The YouTube mobile app for iOS and Android now has new video settings that might make it a bit easier to save on data while watching video on the go (via MacRumors). Along with specific resolutions in the video player, you can now toggle between three separate modes that either favor video quality, data use, or whatever works best for your current internet connection. You might already be familiar with “auto” mode as the default setting for most videos, which automatically adjusts video resolution depending on your current internet speed to give the best experience. YouTube’s new additions are the “higher picture quality” mode, which uses more data when not on Wi-Fi and defaults to 720p, and a “data saver” mode that maxes out at 480p. YouTube’s new video settings include options for “highe...