Table of contents for March 2019 in T3

Our mission is to bring you the clearest recommendations we can – and that means a great deal of hard work happens before a product even reaches our pages! Because we only feature products the T3 team would happily use ourselves, we end up discarding a significant number of options in each category before settling on a final shortlist to review. We select only the best of the best for our Tested section; the gear we know you’ll want to seriously consider purchasing. And that should mean an end to you having to undertake hours of painstaking research and product comparisons. You won’t see any duff products, but you will come away with clarity on which one is the best in its category or for a specific task: our awards…

Months of cold weather have already passed at this time of year, so it’s likely that your skin has suffered the extremes of icy temperatures and extra heating to compensate for it. This can leave the skin on your face and hands feeling rough. While you could go for all-out professional treatment, there is plenty you can do to move towards healthier skin in winter. To find out the best approach, T3 asked Susan Mortimer, director of brand Hey Gorgeous Skincare (heygorgeous.uk), how it’s done. Mortimer recommends a range of products, namely an activated charcoal cleanser, vitamin C serum for collagen regeneration, plus moisturiser and eye cream as part of a daily routine. “Men should cleanse and moisturise their skin on a daily basis,” Mortimer says. “Clean and hydrated are…

NUTRI NINJA BLENDER WITH AUTO-IQ Ensure you eat plenty of fruit and veg by blending them into a nutrientpacked smoothie. This blender from Ninja promises to extract all of the vitamins from your ingredients. A 1,000-watt motor and patented Pro Extractor Blades promise no more lumps, no more waste. £66, ninjakitchen.eu.uk PHILIPS SOMNEO SLEEP AND WAKE UPLIGHT For a better night’s sleep, upgrade your lighting. The Philips Somneo has a winddown function that uses light, sound and breathing techniques to help you sleep. It gradually wakes you up by bathing your bedroom in warm light. £149, philips.co.uk OZMO ACTIVE SMART BOTTLE Stay hydrated with the Ozmo Smart Bottle, which tracks your water and coffee consumption. LED lights show how hydrated you are, and vibrations remind you to drink up. The…

INSTANT POT SMART WI-FI PRESSURE COOKER This programmable, appcontrolled pressure cooker with Google Assistant support helps you switch to healthier cooking without changing your dining routine. £116, instantpot.com CUISINART STM1000U COOKFRESH STEAMER Place your ingredients into this and it will infuse them with steam, unsurprisingly, cooking dishes quickly and healthily. More nutrients are retained in the food this way. £175, cuisinart.co.uk NUTRIBULLET DESSERT BULLET Use this to blitz or whip fruit into sorbet or frozen yoghurt within moments, making it perfect for when those sweet treat cravings hit, yet you don’t want to fall off the good food bandwagon. £49, highstreettv.com…

The days of scoffing at the iPad as a tool for real work have long passed – tablets are used in everything from design studios to hospitals. In most cases, anything you do on a PC you can do on a tablet… but not necessarily everything. While tablets are perfectly suited for many applications when given a touch-friendly interface, they’re not always perfect – and there are significant differences between the operating systems they run and the apps you can get. If you’re looking at buying a new mobile computer, the speed and portability of a tablet may be tempting, but is it best for you? We’ll take you through the options, so you can work out which (if any) will be your new travel buddy instead of a classic…

AFFINITY PHOTO Full-fat Photoshop is imminent on iPad, but Affinity is basically that, now, for £19.99. It’s good on iPads of all flavours but it’s particularly great on the iPad Pro, where the huge amount of horsepower can be used for advanced editing. AFFINITY DESIGNER Affinity Designer is the Illustrator to Affinity Photo’s Photoshop, a superb vector illustration app with desktop-grade tools. The combo of Affinity Designer, iPad Pro and Apple Pencil is glorious, and great value too: like its sibling, it’s £19.99. NEBO 2 At last count there were eleventy billion note-taking apps for iPad and stylus/Apple Pencil, but Nebo stands out thanks to its astonishingly good handwriting recognition. The rest of the app is pretty great too, and it’s just £7.99. PDF EXPERT The £9.99 PDF Expert can…

OFFICE 365 Microsoft’s mighty suite is crossplatform these days, but of course its spiritual home is on Windows. It’s cloud- and subscription-based; if you prefer a one-off payment Microsoft also offers Office 2019 in a range of versions. CORELDRAW GRAPHICS SUITE Corel’s £569 package is particularly good on the Surface Pro, where it supports the Surface Dial accessory for effortless control of your tools and brushes as well as the properties of the selected objects. It supports the Surface Pen too. PLUMBAGO Plumbago is an experimental app from the Microsoft Garage, and it promises to reinvent the notebook with beautiful handwriting, realistic ink and paper, easy navigation and effortless syncing and sharing. It’s a joy to use with a stylus and it’s free. ADOBE CREATIVE CLOUD Whether you’re a web…

IT’S FALLEN OUT OF FASHION IN RECENT YEARS BUT THERE IS�STILL A LOT TO BE SAID FOR TRUE STEREO SOUND Wireless speakers have caused one big change in the world’s listening habits, and it’s not really a step forward: most of them are effectively mono, not stereo. This has undoubted benefits in terms of ease of setup, as they can be placed just about anywhere, but it does make for a less luxurious audio experience. Practically all music is still recorded in stereo, and particularly with predominantly acoustic and classical music – and prog rock, of course – it’s best enjoyed whilst sat in the ‘sweet spot’ in front of a pair of stereo speakers, so you get the full effect. That’s not how a lot of people listen to…

The 5G rollout may focus on delivering faster wireless broadband first As you might have guessed from the name, 5G – the fifth generation of mobile technology – is the successor to 4G. It’s due to start arriving (lightly) this year, and the difference between the abilities of 4G and 5G is stark. On paper, 5G is faster than any currently available Wi-Fi tech, and faster even than any home broadband available anywhere outside South Korea. 4G LTE, the fastest standard currently available in the UK, is around 100 times slower than 5G when considering theoretical lab maximums. That’s huge. It’s also not entirely realistic; in real-world applications, 5G may introduce a 50 times increase in speed, though we’d wager it’ll be less than that when all is said and…

As one of the UK’s four biggest mobile networks, Vodafone is poised to be a big part of the 5G revolution. T3 caught up with Scott Petty, Chief Technology Officer at Vodafone UK, to talk the tricky ins and outs of getting 5G online. T3 How quickly is the 5G rollout likely to happen worldwide? What does the UK 5G roadmap look like? SP In the UK, 5G will roll out throughout 2019. This will be released using the current 5G standards (Non Standalone Architecture), where the existing 4G layer will be used as an anchor. The main challenges are the evolving software standards through the radio core and devices, and keeping those aligned for launch, as well as physically building mobile cell sites to allow for the new antenna…

£1,149 asus.com Laptops have been around for a long time, and it’s not so much that they’re in danger of being boring, it’s more that it’s kind of hard to keep them interesting. The next wave of innovation seems to be around more screens – Apple has the Touch Bar on MacBook Pros, and Asus is swapping out its trackpad for a touchscreen. It’s not the first time this has been tried, but Asus does good stuff with its hardware, so we figured it has a chance of actually working here… Premium touch Asus knows how to make a goodlooking laptop, and the ZenBook Pro isn’t a disappointment in that regard. This laptop doesn’t just look good though, it feels good too. There’s a premium vibe to the materials, and…

MATT BOLTON Editor Matt scoured the halls of CES, leaving no giant stand unturned, hunting down the coolest tech coming in 2019 (p37). Not much stands up to the rollable TV on our cover, but the Alexa toilet was close. MICHELLE MCLAREN Art Editor The new long-range Nissan Leaf (p10) is top of Michelle’s wishlist. The 239-mile range is now enough to get through an entire Saturday of ferrying the kids everywhere they demand to go. Revolutionary. PAUL DOUGLAS Global Editor-in-Chief Boss man Paul needs the best internet connection all the time for all the bossing he has to fit in. Our feature on the arrival of 5G (p73) shows how he’ll be bossing more efficiently than ever soon. ROB JONES Tech & Gaming Editor Rob took on the job…

1 NISSAN LEAF E+3. ZERO • From £35,000, nissan.co.uk According to reports, a Nissan Leaf was sold every ten minutes in Europe last year, making it the continent’s best-selling electric vehicle. Without wishing to rub it in, those people might’ve been better off waiting a few months, because the company has already trumped 2018’s second-gen model with two brand-new editions, the 3.ZERO and the e+ 3.ZERO. Okay, so the cheaper 3.ZERO doesn’t differ too much from last year’s car: the main developments include a larger, eight-inch infotainment screen that offers Tesla-esque door-to-door navigation, plus some new colour choices including two-tone options. The higher-end e+ 3.ZERO represents a sizeable upgrade, primarily because it contains a 62kWh battery, as opposed to the 2018 Leaf’s and the standard 3.ZERO’s 40kWh units. That equates…

CARL F BUCHERER, MANERO FLYBACK CHRONOGRAPH This stylish timepiece captures the spirit of bygone eras with a smooth 18k rose gold case, convex sapphire crystal, and striking mushroom push buttons. £TBC, carl-f-bucherer.com TUDOR, GLAMOUR DOUBLE DATE The updated version of Tudor’s classic dress watch features a new Manufacture Calibre movement visible through the case back, a small seconds hand, and refined dial. £2,640, tudorwatch.com CHRISTOPHER WARD, C65 TRIDENT AUTOMATIC This self-winding timepiece is the newest addition to Christopher Ward’s successful C65 Trident Collection. It features a modified bezel and a bold new dial. £ 695, christopherward.co.uk…

AIRBUBBL Attach this to your headrest, and its nano-carbon filter will remove 95% of pollutants – including pollen and bacteria – from the air within 10 minutes. £299, airbubbl.com MOODO GO Fitting into your cup holder, and powered by your in-car USB port, the Moodo Go features interchangeable scent capsules and a dial to adjust intensity. $39 (£30), moodo.co HALFORDS UPHOLSTERY CLEANER A deep-cleaning foam to help remove offending stains and smells. It dries quickly, too, so you won’t have to wait ages to get seated again. £3.50 for 500ml, halfords.com…

BOSE NOISEMASKING SLEEPBUDS Get some quality shuteye when backpacking with Bose’s rechargeable Sleepbuds, pre-loaded with soothing sounds to mask external noises without distracting you from sleep. Set an alarm (via the Bose Sleep app) to play through the Sleepbuds to avoid waking others. £229, bose.co.uk LIFESTRAW STEEL Paranoid about drinking contaminated water while backpacking around the world? Dip the slimline Lifestraw Steel into your water source and it will filter out 99.9999 per cent of waterbased bacteria, helping you stay in good health. £30, lifestraw.com AN KER POWERCORE 20100 Any backpacker worth their salt wouldn’t leave home without a decent powerbank, and this lightweight model will win over the heavy tech users among you. It supports high speed charging, and juices phones, tablets, action cams and more. £34, anker.com/uk…

While winter flu season often means a visit to the doctor, or weeks suffering through symptom after symptom at home, smart home tech can ease your recovery, especially with voice activated gadgets such as the Amazon Echo 2nd Gen (£79, amazon.co.uk). Need flu pills, tissues or throat lozenges? Ask Alexa to order them. If the postie arrives with your care package while you’re tucked up in your sick bed, use the Ring Video Doorbell 2 (£179, ring.com) to ask them to leave the parcel in a safe place until you’re able to get up and retrieve it. Heating has an impact on your symptoms and your recovery. If you’re experiencing a sore throat, keeping cooler temperatures at night could help prevent your throat from drying out; a happy throat enables…

The fight against the flea menace in Guru Towers continues, and teaches GaGu a little something abou the perils of buying gadgets blind. Buoyed by Amazon reviews including phrases like ‘have caught many hundreds of fleas’ and ‘after 7 days there were a horrifying 135 stuck in there’ (nice counting) Guru picked up the seemingly magical Big Cheese Flea Killer (£14). It’s a super-sticky pad with a little light bulb above that convinces the fleas it’s the warmth of an animal, and it works really well. If only Gagu had read the other comments (‘Be careful an inquisitive cat doesn’t get stuck to it… There will be blood. Probably yours.’) he might have saved himself some wounds. On to Microsoft’s Windows 10 S Mode, then. Your favourite gadget uncle happens…

The new iPad Pro is the world’s best tablet, and it presents power users with an interesting dilemma: not only does it outscore all but the most powerful MacBook Pros in benchmarks, but it’s very similarly priced to them. The 13-inch MacBook Pro is currently £1,249 for the 128GB model; the 12.7-inch iPad Pro with 256GB – there’s no 128GB model – is £1,119 (an 11-inch version is available for £919 with 256GB). The redesigned and improved Apple Pencil adds a further £119 to the bill. The fact that a tablet has that kind of processor power and still manages all-day battery life is impressive, but the difference from laptop to slate is in how it does things, both in terms of its shape and its operating system. An iPad…

Google’s interest in Android tablets appears to wax and wane: its last Android tablet was the impressive but expensive Pixel C, quietly discontinued in late 2017. It’s been left to third-party firms to fly the Android tablet flag, and there are also some very good pro-level ones from the likes of Lenovo, Huawei and Samsung. Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S4 is our favourite Android equivalent to an iPad Pro, and feels high quality. Its S Pen is great for note-taking and PDF annotation, and like the iPad you can add a hardware keyboard if you’d rather not type on glass. It’s a little bit dated performance-wise – its Qualcomm 835 can’t compete with Apple’s newer and considerably faster A12X chip – but it’s perfectly adequate for everyday work and it’s cheaper…

ChromeOS was initially devised as a Windows alternative to power extremely cheap PCs. So what should you make of the Google Pixel Slate, which weighs in at a whopping £1,549 for the 8th-generation Intel Core i7 model plus another £189 for the Google Pixel Slate Keyboard? It’s clearly Google’s attempt at a Surfacestyle device, a super-charged Chromebook in a premium tablet body that should have a halo effect on the entire ChromeOS range. Google’s ChromeOS is no longer just the Chrome browser but a fully-fledged operating system that runs Chrome apps, web apps and Android apps, and which enables you to run apps such as Google Docs in multiple windows. However, even on the more powerful Slates it can be very laggy; in our review of the Slate we noted…

Microsoft was making tablets long before Apple – its Tablet PC was announced back in 2001 – but since the rise of the Surface line, it’s finally challenged the iPad. The Surface Pro is very close to a laptop in terms of size and weight, but the Surface Go gives us the usability and portability we crave, with a 10-inch screen and lighter body. It starts from £379, but that’s extremely slight on power – the sweet spot is around the £500 mark, where the Go comes with significantly faster storage. The most important thing is that it comes with full Windows, so you can use whatever apps you need – no restrictions. Well, actually, it comes with Windows 10S, which means you can only install apps from the Windows…

01 TIDAL HIFI The great thing about this service is you can stream CD quality audio, although it does cost £20 per month rather than the usual tenner charged by most streaming services. If you’re into music and shelling out for a premium speaker, it is well worth it, mind. Further benefits include MQA hi-res audio on compatible speakers – none of these is MQA compatible, however. Tunes can be downloaded for offline playback, as well. 02 SPOTIFY You probably don’t need to be told about Spotify – 320kbps streaming sounds easily good enough for most ears, there are millions of playlists to be heard (and made), and £10 a month is very reasonable. Spotify Connect is a bit of a godsend as it means you can do without the…

From £499 hihonor.com With its visually arresting and gorgeously bold Aurora nanotexture backplate, the big focus on gaming and consuming media, and an AI-packing camera system that seems geared towards recording and interacting with real-world experiences in an immediate way, the Honor View 20 feels like its pitching hard to the younger audience. Core blimey! The phone lacks some of the high-end features and refinements of the most expensive handsets, but it sheds these as superfluous for its intended user, instead focusing on what the younger generations want, and doing so while maintaining a flagship core spec at a far from flagship price. As such, whether or not the View 20 is the right phone for you depends on who you are and what you value in a handset. We…

01 COMPLETE FITNESS MADE EASY FITBIT IONIC £195, fitbit.com With the ability to store music, detect crunches and other gym workouts, as well as having built-in GPS and pulse tracking, this is the most complete tracker Fitbit has made, yet retains the company’s easy-touse approach for beginners. Tracking of steps, distance covered, calories burned and so on is here, with lots of extra options including coaching, for going up a notch. It’s also something of a smartwatch, but only in a very basic way. Annoyingly, the heart rate monitor is inaccurate at lower rates (it’s fine when higher). The battery lasts four days. 02 PERFECT PLACE TO START FITBIT CHARGE 3 £129, fitbit.com This is the best simple fitness band (rather than watch), no question. It tracks deep and light…

£349 spire.live Back in the day, it was harder to make music than it is now. Musicians and producers would often have to rely on specialised equipment to get the sound they wanted, and were tied to traditional recording studios. These days, most computers or an iPad can act as an audio workstation for recording tracks anywhere. Audio tech brand iZotope hopes to make the process even simpler by packing handy multi-track recording into this portable, user-friendly gadget. Line ’em up The Spire Studio records up to eight tracks, one after another, with a few simple button presses, and is powered by battery or from the mains. The interface is stripped to the bone, making it a doddle to navigate. In fact, there are only five buttons to contend with:…

Dash cams are one of the best upgrades you can make to your car, helping to reassure you that you’ll be able to prove you were in the right if an accident occurs. You need ultra-clear footage to do that, though, which is where the first true 4K dash cam, the Nextbase 612GW, comes in. This camera is so good it won our own prestigious T3 Award as the Best Car Gadget of 2018. But it’s not just us who noted its quality – it’s also Which?’s highestreviewed dash cam of all time. The 612GW is able to provide the best image quality on the market thanks to the Sony Exmor R 4K sensor, capturing video at 3840x2180 resolution at 30fps, though you can also choose to record at 1080p…

If you’re looking for the very best tech available today, you’ve definitely come to the right place. Best of the Best is the most useful gadgetbuying guide you will ever encounter. To create it, we’ve extensively tested the best tech the world has to offer, to bring you rock-solid recommendations for your home life, daily commute and the tech you use all the time. In 54 different categories, we’ve chosen the top four products, so you can choose one that’s just the right mix of features and budget for what you need. These rankings come from real testing by our team of experts – they’re the products we’d choose for ourselves, and we can’t recommend any higher than that. Look for the links above each category that take you to…

It’s quite thoughtful that the biggest gadget trade show is right at the start of January, because it really sets the pace for the year ahead, and gives us a chance to look at what’s worth digging into. The three big things you’re going to hear tons about in 2019 are 8K TVs, 5G, and basically every appliance in the world being controllable from Alexa and Google Assistant. The last of those is no surprise – one of 2018’s big trends was building Alexa and Assistant into pretty much anything, so now it’s only logical to make everything from taps to slow cookers controllable via them. 8K TVs are going to be more of a slow burn – it looks like Samsung has the field to itself until the second…

THE COAT Whichever film premiere he attends, Boseman always looks confident and dapper. This checked camel overcoat holds the outfit together. Try a lookalike checked coat from Mr P. (mrporter.com, £472). THE TROUSERS Alternating to trousers in a darker brown than the coat provides a clever colour anchor for this outfit. A similar side-striped pair from Stella McCartney works a treat. (matchesfashion.com, £310) THE SHOES Boseman keeps it low-key with a simple pair of boots, but which also strengthen his posture. Copy this with a well-cut pair of Chelsea boots from Leqarant. (farfetch.com, £208)…

2019 marks the 70th anniversary of the Countryside and National Parks Act, which led to the creation of the UK’s national parks. To celebrate, head to the most child-friendly park of them all, Exmoor National Park. Little ones can sign up for craft workshops, guided walks and ‘pips to plants’ gardening sessions. Did you know that Chitty Chitty Bang Bang turned 50 last year? Celebrate with a visit to Beaulieu, a motoring museum that recently unveiled a Chitty exhibition, which runs until November. Exhibits include cars and costumes from the film (under fives go free, general admission from £12.50, beaulieu.co.uk). Further afield, British Airways and EasyJet recently launched flights to Lyon, one of Europe’s most child-friendly cities. Highlights include the Tête d’Or Park, with its carousels and boat lake, and…

Thanks to Cristiano Ronaldo, Serena Williams and, er, Mark Wahlberg, people are going sports-crazy for cryotherapy, but what exactly is it? In a nutshell, it involves immersing your body in a cryochamber set at -135°C for up to three minutes, which is said to have benefits such as reducing chronic pain and fatigue, and healing damaged muscles by increasing blood flow and oxygen. Keen to try it? One session at the Harrods Wellness Clinic costs £95 (harrods.com), or you can rent a cryochamber from CryoAction (£POA, cryoaction.com).…

NIGHTFLYERS Netflix science fiction space spooks based on a George RR Martin novella – less Game Of Thrones, more Game Of Oh God What Is That Thing And What Does It Want. DREAM PLAZA Mélonade’s neat album imagines a world where we are all trapped in a mall. Thankfully, it’s a bouncy, glitchy mall with some of the smoothest muzak going. SLAY THE SPIRE Guru’s daily Steam game of choice: climb a tower, build a deck of deadly cards as you go, and use them to beat up monsters. Properly addictive, and brilliantly balanced.…

SKETCHBOOK We’ve recommended this Autodesk app for Windows tablets too: it’s a superb sketching app with some very good brushes and realistic textures. It’s freemium: the core app is free but you can get extra bits if you’re willing to pay. TEAMVIEWER TeamViewer is a remote access app that enables you to remotely control a Windows, Mac or Linux box from your Android device. It’s easy to use and works very well on tablets, and if it’s for personal use, it’s free. TODOIST One of the world’s favourite taskmanagement apps is available as a freemium Android app and as a plugin for the Chrome browser, as well as for every other major platform. It’s really good for managing complex or large projects. MICROSOFT WORD While many apps offer Word compatibility,…

ADOBE SPARK If you’d like to share your story online but don’t want to be stuck to a specific social network, Adobe’s free app is an interesting and useful alternative. It’s extremely easy to put together visually compelling content and share it anywhere you choose. EVERNOTE WEB Evernote is a freemium notetaking app that enables you to store almost anything, including documents, images and audio. Although largely aimed at businesses it’s good for creative projects, home improvements or anything else involving a lot of information. POLARR PHOTO EDITOR Polarr is available on Android, but the Chrome version makes better use of available screen space. It’s a freemium photo editor that works offline, offers a good range of filters and enables you to create complex projects using layers and blending. TODOIST…

1 MICROSOFT SURFACE PRECISION MOUSE We like the way Microsoft mice feel in the hand, and the Surface Precision Mouse is a comfortable, smoothscrolling and very precise mouse. Sadly it’s quite expensive too, although you can use it to work seamlessly across three different computers. £99, microsoft.com 2 MICROSOFT SURFACE PEN Once again, cheaper third party devices are also available, but Microsoft’s Surface Pen is designed specifically for Surface devices and feels really great to use – drawing response time on the screen is almost impeccable. £99, microsoft.com 3 MICROSOFT SURFACE GO SIGNATURE TYPE COVER The official Microsoft keyboard cover for the Go is prettier and pricer than most third party offerings, and as you’d expect it turns the Surface Go into a more laptop-y experience, complete with trackpad. It’s…

£399 store.google.com The world of Google Assistant speakers has yet to explode in the way that Alexa-powered audio has. Here in the UK, we’ve been especially limited for options when it comes to big and high-end sound powered by Google, but that changes with the Home Max. A touch of class Sticking with the fabric cover and soft-touch plastic styling of the Home Mini, the Max comes in one finish with a white body and light grey fabric, and one where both are charcoal. We like the design, and though it’s among the biggest smart speakers so far, it doesn’t feel too imposing. The Max is built to a really high quality, and has some serious heft to it. At this size and price, the sound quality has to stand…

RÉMY MARTIN LOUIS XIII SMART DECANTER Unless you’re over 80, or have appeared on Bullseye, you’ve probably never owned a decanter. But you might want to break that habit for this little gem. Designed for fans of Rémy Martin’s luxury Louis XIII cognac, it’s the first such receptacle to boast smart connectivity. Once you’ve registered with private members’ club the Louis XIII Society, simply tap your NFC-enabled phone or tablet on the mouth-blown, crystal cork stopper and you’ll activate a range of swanky benefits: bespoke engraving services; notifications of limited-edition releases; access to a private advisor for arranging personal tastings; and an invitation to network with Louis XIII lovers all over the world. If ever there was a reason to develop an unhealthy drinking habit, this is it. £TBC, louisxiii-cognac.com…