Technology

Lenovo isn’t a major player in the gaming chair scene, but its Demon Slayer-themed creation shows that it could easily dice up the competition if it chose to. Per Kotaku, the company has made a limited edition chair that has a holstered katana built onto its side. But before you imagine spinning around in the chair with a sword out, there’s sadly no katana in the holster. Is it false advertising to make a Demon Slayer chair with which you can’t actually slay demons? Doubly sad is that you can’t buy the chair. Only five are being made for a giveaway promo in Japan. Hey, if you live in Japan, follow Lenovo of Japan’s Twitter account, then retweet a tweet, and try to win this chair on behalf of us all. All of the necessary parts are here, except for the katana itself.Image: Lenovo Lenovo says...

Intel launched a new ad campaign starring Justin Long, Apple’s “I’m a Mac” actor, but for this campaign, Long is singing the praises of PC laptops and comparing them to MacBooks. The thing is, for reasons that we can’t quite figure out, Intel actually made the MacBook Pros in its commercials look better than they do in real life, as spotted by tech YouTuber Rene Ritchie. Take a look at these two photos. The one on the left is a photo of a MacBook Pro with an M1 chip taken for The Verge’s review. The one on the right is taken from this Intel ad. Can you spot the difference? I’ll spoil it for you: Intel’s version of the MacBook Pro has much thinner screen bezels, making it a nearly edge-to-edge display. I’d love it if my MacBook’s bezels were this thin! (Though Intel’s version of a MacBook P...

Fontemon is technically a font, but it’s also, somewhat miraculously, a playable miniature Pokémon parody, spotted by software engineer Daniel Feldman. The game, made by Michael Mulet, stretches my understanding of what a font is, but it’s certainly amazing. Also, it’s filled with Minnesota references. The experience is not as “smooth” as a modern Pokémon game or even the original Game Boy entries, but it is sort of reminiscent of typing on a typewriter, with user interface elements and half-font / half-monsters plopping down on the screen as if they were slammed there by a type bar. The Minnesota elements might feel out of place, but they’re pretty funny overall. You’ll battle your way through Ottowa, Lakeville, and a pair of “Twin Cities” and be treated to instances of Minnesota Nice and...

Astell & Kern — the company best known for its high-end portable digital audio players — is making a USB-C DAC (digital-to-analog converter) that’s designed to help get better-sounding audio from modern smartphones and computers that may lack a 3.5mm headphone jack. If you want to use any digital device with a 3.5mm headphone jack, you need a DAC. Older devices that had 3.5mm headphone jacks featured integrated DACs (some better than others, like LG’s famous Quad DAC system on its former flagships). But the death of the 3.5mm headphone jack on modern smartphones in favor of exclusively USB-C (or in Apple’s case, Lightning ports) has left a gap for audiophiles. Now if you want to use older headphones or sound setups, you’ll need a USB-C to 3.5mm headphone jack dongle — which, by default...

OnePlus will be formally announcing the 9 and 9 Pro phones, a smartwatch, and a blazing fast wireless charger on March 23rd — but why wait? OnePlus definitely isn’t: it’s been spoiling its own announcements non-stop on Twitter, YouTube, and even right here at The Verge. One day the CEO will tweet out which processor the phone will use; the next, the company will just upload pictures of the phone from multiple angles! If you haven’t been keeping up, we’ve compiled all the… leaks? mini-announcements? in one place. Confirmed by OnePlus OnePlus has been in the habit lately of trying to build up suspense for its events, which is why you see it and its executives just tweeting out information about the phones. Here’s what we’ve learned from them: There will be at least two phones The OnePl...

Facebook has resolved a major outage affecting Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and other Facebook services on Friday, according to a statement shared with The Telegraph’s Margi Murphy. “Earlier today, a technical issue caused people to have trouble accessing some Facebook services,” Facebook said. “We resolved this issue for everyone, and we apologize for any inconvenience.” However, Murphy notes that she isn’t seeing the blue checkmarks that indicate someone has read your message, which could indicate there may be some small issues hanging around. Facebook on the outage: “Earlier today, a technical issue caused people to have trouble accessing some Facebook services. We resolved this issue for everyone, and we apologize for any inconvenience.” Messages are going through for me on...

Woot is offering the first sizable discount on Samsung’s new Galaxy Buds Pro wireless earbuds that were introduced a few months ago alongside the Galaxy S21 phones. Originally $200, they’re $170, and you can choose between three colors: violet, silver, or black. Samsung makes a few sets of truly wireless earbuds that look similar, but these ones have the best sound quality the company has achieved yet. Some other perks noted in Chris Welch’s review include a handy voice detection feature to automatically dim the music and switch from active noise canceling to ambient mode when you start talking so you can hear yourself. They also have IPX7 protection against water and sweat (they’re workout-friendly) and improved microphones for chatting on calls. Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro $170 $200 15% off ...

After years of development and delays, Super Nintendo World finally opened this week at Universal Studios Japan (USJ) in Osaka. The themed area of the park is Nintendo’s biggest swing yet to leverage its most iconic characters beyond its traditional home of video game consoles. The idea sounds strong on paper. USJ is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Asia, and Universal has experience in the field, having launched the conceptually similar Wizarding World of Harry Potter themed areas at three of its parks, including Osaka. What could go wrong? Well, a global coronavirus pandemic, for one thing. The park is launching under less than ideal circumstances; it was originally planned to open ahead of the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, which were also delayed to this year. And even in more n...

Ollie was asleep at three in the morning when the Discord app on his phone started blowing up. He panicked; many of his friends lived in different time zones, but they knew how late it was for him. The only reason they’d be frantically messaging him in the middle of the night is if something terrible happened. Bolting awake, he checked his messages. “OLLIE, DREAM JUST GAVE YOU A SHOUTOUT ON TWITTER!” “DREAM SHOUTED YOU OUT!” A high school student and artist, Ollie spends much of his free time making fan art about his favorite Minecraft streamers. In one illustration, he shows his favorite creator, Dream, with a green-and-black hoodie, black nail polish on his fingers, and messy black hair — something Ollie had to invent since no one has ever seen Dream’s face. Dream, arguably the main char...

OtterBox, the company best known for its ruggedized cases, has developed a $30 clip that can attach your phone to an Xbox controller for playing games. Called the Mobile Gaming Clip, it’s part of a growing trend of accessories for playing cloud-based console games right on your phone. What makes OtterBox’s clip different is it can also work as a phone stand, separate from the controller — although the phone stand feature isn’t quite as robust as what I was hoping for. OtterBox’s clip is designed specifically for Xbox controllers, and it works with controllers made for the Xbox One, Series X / S, or the Elite Series 2 controller. There’s also a little cutout for the charging port, meaning if you need to connect your Xbox controller to a USB cable, you will not need to remove the clip from t...

The NFL has signed long-term television and digital media rights agreements that greatly expand availability to a variety of streaming platforms. Notably, Amazon has scored exclusive rights to Thursday Night Football in the first ever all-digital package. The deal begins with the 2023 season and extends through 2033. “NFL games are the most watched live programming in the United States, and this unprecedented Thursday Night Football package gives tens of millions of new and existing Prime members exclusive access to must-watch live football on Prime Video,” said Mike Hopkins, SVP of Prime Video and Amazon Studios in a press release announcing the deal. The ten-year deal is rumored to cost Amazon about $1 billion per year, according to CNBC’s sources. Amazon has been the NFL’s streaming med...

NASA test-fired the core stage of its massive Space Launch System rocket on Thursday, rattling its south Mississippi test facilities for a duration well beyond what engineers needed for a clean demonstration. The team carried out its second attempt for the hot-fire run after cutting short an initial firing in January. Pending a review of the test’s data, engineers are aiming to ship the rocket stage to Florida ahead of its debut test flight to the Moon under NASA’s Artemis program. Mounted in a behemoth test facility at NASA’s Stennis Space Center, the 212-foot-tall rocket stage’s four RS-25 engines ignited together for over eight minutes to test the conditions of a real liftoff. NASA and its prime contractor, Boeing, needed to reach at least four minutes of continuous test time to call it...