Is this a delicious Sony PS5 Pro controller leak, or a chocolate PS5 DualSense treat for my birthday? 🤔
Today is my 40th birthday, and I’m extremely appreciative of the journey I’ve been on and the support everyone has shown me and The Shortcut team. I’ve been exploring the world of tech as a writer since I was 13 years old, became the US Editor-in-Chief at TechRadar where I got invaluable training, and have happily grown The Shortcut to be the #1 consumer tech publication on Substack.🥳
With the help of paid subscribers, we’re building something a bit different (more to come soon) – and we need to given the fact that so many big-name technology publications have closed, even more have downsizing, and constant threat of unreliable AI-based journalism is at our doortstep.
So thank you for allowing us to tell stories – like the Apple Vision Pro review – as humans (even though we sometimes look like cyborgs🤖).
Today’s 10-story newsletter continues below the spotlight & calendar ⤵️
I have more discount codes for gift cards. This weekend, I found ones for the PlayStation Store, Apple, and Xbox Game Pass.
*If Eneba sells out, stay tuned for more (deals expire on Monday morning).
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🏜️ Apr 25, Thurs: Sand Land release date – pre-order now
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⚔️ Apr 26, Fri: Stellar Blade release date – pre-order now
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🤖 May 14, Tues: Google IO keynote at 1pm ET
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💻 June 3, Mon: Computex begins in Taipei (we’ll be there)
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🍎 June 10, Mon: Apple WWDC 2024 keynote
Work on the next God of War game appears to be underway, as Sony has begun hiring for key positions at developer Sony Santa Monica. Fans of Kratos were recently treated to a free DLC update for God of War Ragnarok, but there’s no doubt gamers have an appetite for more axe-swinging action on the PS5 and rumored PS5 Pro.
Sony admitted we won’t see “any existing major franchise titles” until March 2025, so don’t expect a God of War sequel to appear anytime soon. Still, it’s nice to know another game could be in development.
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🪓 A new God of War game is likely in development and likely for PS5
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👀 New job listings suggest work is revamping up the next title
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📆 Sony has ruled out any major franchise titles until March 2025, so don’t expect a release date soon
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🔮 Showing a ‘first look’ when PS5 Pro is announced could be in the cards
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👍 God of War Ragnarok sold 15 million units and recently received free DLC
The bass-heavy Sony Ult Wear is a fantastic pair of wireless noise-canceling headphones for $199. Thanks to a litany of updates and improvements – including improved noise-canceling, wear detection, Multipoint connectivity, and spatial audio with head tracking – it’s almost on par with Sony’s more premium WH-1000-series headphones.
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✅ 🙉 Improved noise-canceling you can use for hours without fatigue
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✅ 🎼 Large and detailed sound stage
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✅ 🔈 Two levels of bass boosting from a pair of already bassy headphones
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❌ 🪨 Large to carry and even bigger on your head
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❌ 🫨 Ult 2 adds overpowering bass with some songs
Apple could introduce two new colors for the iPhone 16, bringing the total number of hues to seven instead of five. A new rumor suggests we could see a white and purple iPhone 16, which would join the existing, black, blue, yellow, green and pink.
Apple didn’t launch a white color iPhone 15, which has always been a popular option and has become with Apple products in general. We’ll have to wait and see if we are getting more color options with the next range of iPhones.
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🆕 Apple may add two new colors to the iPhone 16 range this year
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🎨 It’s rumored that we could see a white and purple color option
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🤍 Apple last released a white standard iPhone with the iPhone 14
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📱 The iPhone 15 included five colors and the Pro models only had four
The Japanese-Canadian brand Kobo has got the jump on Amazon and released two new color ereaders, which might make Kindle owners a little jealous. The Kobo Libra Colour and the Kobo Clara Colour are upgraded versions of the Kobo Libra 2 and Kobo Clara 2E ereaders and are available to pre-order today.
The Kobo Libra Color costs $219.99 and the Kobo Clara Colour is available for $149.99. Both ereaders include WiFi 5 and Bluetooth compatibility and the same dual-core processor. The Kobo Clara Colour has a 6-inch screen, while the Libra has a 7-inch screen that supports the Kobo Stylus for sketching and handwriting. The stylus is sold separately, however.
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🆕 Kobo is releasing two new color ereaders
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📆 The Kobo Libra Colour and Kobo Clara Colour are available to preorder now
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💰 Prices start from $149.99 for the Clara Colour and $219.99 for the Libra Colour
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🖊️ The Libra Colour includes stylus support for sketching, notation and writing
I’ve been reviewing and testing Roku TVs for over ten years, starting with the first US TV review on TechRadar, the OG TCL Roku TV. Now, Roku, once a pure streaming software and operating system company, has been making its own television hardware recently and this is their most refined 4K television set yet.
It’s on sale now at stores like Best Buy, Amazon and Walmart starting at $899, and in addition to the AI-tuned picture enhancements, this mini-LED QLED TV comes with a new remote. The remote is backlit, charged via USB-C, and has a lost remote finder feature that we’ve wanted for decades.
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📺 Roku Pro Series TVs are high-end QLED displays with a Mini LED backlight
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🎮 Gaming-ready with a 120Hz, VRR and FreeSync Premium Pro
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💵 Screen sizes range from 55-75 inches with prices going from $899 to $1,699
No one likes vacuuming – or at least no one we know – but Dyson’s new VR tech called CleanTrace could at least make it a little more fun, and effective. CleanTrace creates a purple overlay that shows the path your vacuum has taken and shows where you haven’t cleaned. It’ll work via your smartphone, though you’ll need the expensive Dyson Gen5detect to use it when it launches in June.
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🎮 Dyson’s new CleanTrace feature adds gamification to vacuuming
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👀 The AR tech shows where you’ve vacuumed and where you haven’t
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📱It’ll work with your smartphone if it has LiDAR
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📆 It’s out in June but only works with the pricey Dyson Gen5detect
It’s the end of an era for Nintendo fans as you can no longer access online servers on Nintendo 3DS and Wii U. Nintendo pulled the plug on its online services on April 8 and shut down both the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U eShop last year in March.
The Nintendo 3DS launched in February 2011 and the Wii U launched in 2012. It means that the Nintendo 3DS’s online service was available for 13 years, and the Wii U was online for 12 years. While the decision isn’t too surprising, it’s still sad that so many great Nintendo games will no longer work or be fully complete now that the online servers are gone.
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🛜 Nintendo has shut down online on Nintendo 3DS and Wii U
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⛔ You can no longer access online on either system
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🛍️ The Nintendo 3DS and Wii U eShops were closed on March 27
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😢 It’s a big blow to video game preservation as many of these titles are now incomplete or inaccessible
A new version of the Apple TV could include a camera and gesture-based controls. In his Power On newsletter, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman said the camera would also support “gesture-based controls”, akin to something like Microsoft’s now-defunct Kinect. It’s unclear exactly what those gestures will do, but Apple could add 3D effects to FaceTime calls like confetti or fireworks when you put two thumbs up.
A new Apple TV with a camera could be popular and would provide an alternative to the discontinued Meta Portal. Apple may announce an update to the Apple TV during WWDC 2024, which takes place on June 10.
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📷 Apple could include a camera in the next version of the Apple TV
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🙋♂️ It will allow users to make FaceTime calls without an external device
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👋 The camera could support gesture-based controls
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🪶 Apple is also working on a “lightweight smart display”
The Nothing Ear and Nothing Ear (a) are set to release on April 18, but we don’t have to wait to see them in all their glory. Images of both wireless earbuds have leaked, along with their prices. The Nothing Ear will cost around $162 (likely $149) and the Nothing Ear (a) will cost $99.
Both earbuds include noise cancellation, waterproofing, around eight hours of playback, quick charging and three color options: black, white, and in the case of the Nothing Ear (a), yellow.
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💧 The Nothing Ear and Ear (a) wireless earbuds have leaked ahead of their launch
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👀 The Nothing Ear will cost around $149 and the Ear (a) will be $100
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🤫 The two earbuds boast similar specs and both have active noise canceling
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📆 The Nothing Ear and Ear (a) launch on April 18
The DJI Avata 2 is a sequel so good it’s the Empire Strikes Back or Terminator 2: Judgment Day (hopefully not literally 😬) of drones. DJI has reinvented its FPV drone with a sleeker, flatter design that’s 28 grams lighter (now 377g in total weight). It flies for longer and further with four more minutes of battery (23 mins total) life and three more kilometers of more range (13km total). The camera has also been upgraded with a 1/1.3-inch sensor that also pitches across a wider arc between -85° to 80°.
The Avata 2 is still a jack-of-all-trades drone that flies and lets you record footage like any of DJI’s other quadcopters and you can also fly it in first-person to pull off dives and barrel rolls like a racing drone. Best of all the price of the DJI Avata 2 is $999 for the Fly More Combo kit that includes the drone, Goggles 3, RC Motion 3, and a spare battery – getting the same package with the DJI Avata costs $1,199.
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🚁 DJI Avata 2 improves on the original with a flatter and lighter design
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🔋Improved battery life for a total of 23 minutes of flight time
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📷 A larger 1/1.3-inch image sensor with physically larger pixels
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🥽 DJI Goggles 3 upgraded with over an hour more battery and dual 1080p, 700-nit micro-OLED displays
