Technology

I’ve used more Acer laptops than most people on the planet. I’ve tested Swifts, Aspires, Travelmates, Spins, ConceptDs, and Predators. More often than not, my assessment is “not bad, but there’s better.” For much of my time covering this company, I’ve associated it with excellent value — and not too much else. To some extent, Acer seems to share this view. Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel and I spoke to Acer CEO Jason Chen and Acer Pan-America President Gregg Prendergast ahead of the company’s global press conference on May 27th, and Patel asked the two to characterize the “Acer customer” — that is, the type of person who seeks out Acer laptops to buy. Chen’s answer implied that the company is still looking for it. “We are building up new business engines,” he says. “We are moving Acer to...

Acer has made three significant upgrades to the best-in-class Chromebook Spin 713. The first is that the device now has Intel’s newest 11th Gen processors. The second is that the USB-C ports both support Thunderbolt 4. And the third is that it now has an optional fingerprint reader. These aren’t the most revolutionary spec bumps in the world. The rest of the Spin 713 remains the same: it has a fantastic 3:2 touch display, a good backlit keyboard, a smooth touchpad, and good value for its premium components. But the changes add up. And they serve to push the Spin 713 even further ahead of its competition than it was before. It’s very much still the Chromebook to buy. Verge Score 8 out of 10 Good Stuff Excellent 3:2 screen Fingerprint sensor Thunderbolt 4 support Bad Stuff Battery life a bit...

It’s been just over three weeks since the Epic v. Apple proceedings kicked off, and the news has been relentless. So as we wait for a verdict to roll in, we’re taking a quick turn through all the biggest takeaways from the trial. A lot of the juiciest points didn’t speak directly to the verdict — like the profit structure of the Xbox or the troubled history of Fortnite crossplay — but that’s part of the fun of a massive trans-corporate dustup like this. Once you start digging through CEO Tim Cook’s inbox, all sorts of interesting stuff comes out. 1] Apple keeps iMessage closed in order to sell more iPhones We’ve known for a while that Apple isn’t going to make iMessage available outside of iOS devices, but this trial showed exactly how thoroughly Apple has considered expanding iMessage int...

Amazon’s Prime Day for 2021 may happen on June 21st and 22nd, according to Bloomberg. Last year’s Prime member-exclusive shopping holiday was delayed until October due to the pandemic. In years prior, Amazon had hosted Prime Day in the summer. But with June upon us, this could mean one of the best times to buy tech, games, movies, and more could be just around the corner. We’ll have that covered end-to-end with all of the best deals. But here are the tech deals you need to know about today. A couple of Beats headphone models with noise cancellation are seeing big discounts today. Firstly, the Beats Solo Pro at Amazon are down to $150 (originally $300), and notably, this sale price is for the black, gray, and ivory colorways that aren’t frequently looped into big price cuts. These are on-ea...

Google is adding a new “Save to Photos” button to Gmail which you can press to automatically save an emailed image to Google Photos, the company has announced. It’s rolling out to personal Gmail users, Google Workspace, G Suite Basic, and G Suite Business customers over the next couple of weeks and will be available alongside the existing “Add to Drive” button. Unfortunately it only works on JPEGs for the time being. Sorry PNG stans. It’s a good time to be getting a more convenient way to add images to Google Photos, because the service’s storage options are getting a big overhaul on June 1st. At that time, the service’s unlimited storage for “high quality” photos will disappear and will be replaced with a 15GB cap. Importantly, any images uploaded before the change comes into force won’t ...

Privacy International (PI) and several other European privacy and digital rights organizations announced today that they’ve filed legal complaints against the controversial facial recognition company Clearview AI. The complaints filed in France, Austria, Greece, Italy, and the United Kingdom say that the company’s method of documenting and collecting data — including images of faces it automatically extracts from public websites — violates European privacy laws. New York-based Clearview claims to have built “the largest known database of 3+ billion facial images.” PI, NYOB, Hermes Center for Transparency and Digital Human Rights, and Homo Digitalis all claim that Clearview’s data collection goes beyond what the average user would expect when using services like Instagram, LinkedIn, or YouT...

Lime is rolling out a new monthly subscription service for its electric scooters that’s called — no joke — Lime Prime. Lime typically charges a fixed rate to unlock a vehicle and then a per-minute fee to ride. For $5.99 a month, the company will waive that initial fee for Lime Prime subscribers. And in markets with no unlock fees, riders will receive 25 percent off the price of their ride. Subscribers will still pay the per-minute charge, but Lime says that someone who uses one of its scooters every day would save approximately $25 a month under the subscription plan. This isn’t the first iteration of Lime’s subscription service There are other perks that come with a subscription. Lime Prime members can reserve any scooter or bike for up to 30 minutes at no cost, for example, compared to j...

Square Enix has announced the latest mainline entry in the Dragon Quest series. Dragon Quest XII: The Flames of Fate was revealed on a livestream to celebrate the series’ 35th anniversary. Not much beyond the game’s logo and title was revealed, but series creator Yuji Horii hinted at some changes to the traditional turn-based battle system, and said Square Enix was aiming for a simultaneous worldwide release. Dragon Quest is the most popular RPG series in Japan. The last game, Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age, was released for the PlayStation 4 and 3DS in its home market in 2017, though the original Western release only came to the PS4 and PC. An updated version, Dragon Quest XI S, was released for the Nintendo Switch and later came to Xbox, PS4, PC, and Stadia. In total, Square E...

Nintendo could release its heavily rumored new version of the Switch in September or October, according to a report by Bloomberg. Manufacturing is reportedly planned to start as soon as July, and Bloomberg says the system may be announced before the E3 trade show, which kicks off in virtual form on June 12th. As Bloomberg notes, an announcement ahead of E3 would allow third-party publishers, as well as Nintendo itself, to show their games running on the new hardware. This version of the Switch is said to use more powerful silicon from Nvidia that works with DLSS technology, allowing for 4K output to a TV. It also reportedly has a 7-inch OLED display sourced from Samsung. Bloomberg says Nintendo’s suppliers are “confident” in their ability to fulfill the orders even though there’s a global ...

In February, Sony revealed it was selling the PlayStation 5 at a loss — but that’s imminently about to change. The PS5 should hit break-even in June, and become profitable the very same month, according to a presentation the company shared with investors (PDF) during its investor day today. Needless to say, that’s fast — happening before the company has even managed to catch up with demand, in the midst of a global chip shortage. (We bemoaned the needless drama of buying a PS5 just days ago!) Mind you, this is for the standard PS5, the one where Sony has to supply a 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray drive and pay as much as $8 per console in licensing fees, and charges you an extra $100 at retail. It’s not clear if Sony’s driveless PS5 Digital Edition is more or less profitable. Profitability isn’t the ...

You’ll be able to join Twitter’s Clubhouse-like Spaces from desktop and mobile web browsers starting Wednesday, the company announced, making the company’s social audio rooms much more widely accessible. Previously, you could only join Spaces from Twitter’s iOS and Android apps. You can get a look at what a Spaces look like on the web in screenshots below, from Twitter. The image on the left shows what you’ll see before joining a Space. The one on the right shows a Space off to the side so you can continue scrolling through Twitter while you listen. Spaces are making their way to Twitter for web! Now you can join a Space to listen in, test out the new transcription design, and set reminders to join a scheduled Space. https://t.co/xFTEeAgM4x — Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) May 26, 2021 ...