Innehållsförteckning för April 2024 från T3

1 NOTHING PHONE (2A) From £319, nothing.tech You don’t normally expect mid-range phones to be more attractive than the flagships from which they borrow. That’s not the way it’s done. But Nothing isn’t a company that does the things it’s supposed to do. Thus it has offered the Phone (2a) a contemporary refresh that really hits the mark. It scales down the range’s Glyph interface to three rear mounted light clusters, but arguably ends up with a classier, cooler design for it. The rear makes even more of the ribbon cables, as artistic as they are functional. The camera bump may be more distinct, but its industrial styling – surrounded by the NFC coil to create what Nothing calls ‘The Eyes’ – makes it work. Even the clear back cover,…

The super shoe business is a cutthroat one, with companies continuously trying to outdo each other using space-age tech to create the lightest and fastest shoes. Hoka has been lagging behind somewhat compared to brands such as Nike, Adidas, New Balance and more. However, the latest addition to the Hoka road racing lineup, the Cielo X1 (£250, hoka.com), might change the status quo. The highest energy return shoe from Hoka to date, the Cielo X1 was designed with insights and feedback from the Hoka roster of elite athletes and features tons of innovative technologies. These include an exaggerated new rocker profile, asymmetrical Active Foot Frame, dynamic winged carbon fibre plate and a cored out midsole. An all-new engineered knit upper provides a lightweight, breathable foot-hugging fit, while the asymmetrical gusseted…

MASERATI GRANTURISMO FOLGORE Maserati is taking orders for its first EV, the GranTurismo Folgore. A whole range of all-electric cars under the name Folgore is expected but the GranTurismo will be the first, with prices starting from £179,950. PORSCHE MACAN SUV Porsche has revealed its second all-electric car, in the form of the all-new Macan SUV. Coming in two variants, the Macan 4 provides the longer 381-mile range, and 403hp, while the Macan Turbo has 631hp and a 3.3 second 0-62mph. ASTON MARTIN VANTAGE Aston has upped the power of its Vantage by a massive 30% and the performance figures land just shy of its DB12 big brother – a 3.4-second 0-60mph time and a 202mph top speed. There’s no price yet, but we expect it to cost around £165,000.…

Q GRACE, VIA EMAIL Can I connect my phone to my car wirelessly? A You’ve probably heard that many big manufacturers are planning to drop support for Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, presumably because they are steaming idiots. Well, let’s just say you should enjoy this while it lasts. The good news is that adapters exist for both platforms that let you go from wired to wireless, even when using a head unit that does not natively support wireless connections. Apple users will want to look at the QuadLock Wireless CarPlay Adaptor (£80), while Android folks must make do with the decidedly more rinkydink-seeming AAWireless (around £60) or one of its countless clones. These sit in your USB port and act as a bridge – once you get in your…

Camping is a nostalgic throwback to childhood, triggering memories of parents fumbling with portable stoves sat atop wobbly tables while we kids danced around, partly for fun, partly to escape pesky bugs. Spending a night in a tent under the blanket of the starry sky has changed significantly since those times. The being in nature element is still very much present, but thanks to innovative technologies, camping in 2024 is a very different experience from yesteryear. In the US alone, a whopping 66 million folks pitched tents in 2021, with 8.3 million embracing camping for the first time. That’s a huge increase year on year. Similar numbers are observed in the UK, where 1 in 5 adults have been camping or caravanning post-Covid. Spending on camping trips increased to £2.7…

When it comes to the best folding phones, the OnePlus Open is a different story to its rivals. It’s a much more ‘normal phone size’ when folded, unlike the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5, making it immediately more usable. Indeed, it’s so commendable in its folded position that we’ve often not made full use of the main display hidden within. Which raises the question: has OnePlus made the best foldable phone but removed the need for its existence in the same breath? With a folded thickness of 11.7mm, it’s not a million miles away from the 8.6mm of the Galaxy S24 Ultra – we’ve never felt as though it’s too big, like some older foldables. The recent Honor Magic V2 is even skinnier though. Not only that, at 6.31 inches,…

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 gadget-buying 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…

A recent New York Times article shocked many, me included, by showing how easily a stolen passcode can ruin your digital and financial life. It centred on iPhones but Android users are no safer. A criminal would observe someone entering their passcode, trick them into giving it away, or worse still make them reveal it at knifepoint. Then they’d steal the phone and change the passcode, change the face in FaceID, the password in AppleID, turn off Find My iPhone, and render the passwords in a keychain unusable, all within a minute or two. My own enthusiasm for financial apps dates back to interviewing an ex-hacker, many years ago. He strongly advised doing online banking through a phone rather than a browser because it was way more secure. Since then,…

Wahoo’s latest home gym equipment offering, the Kickr Run Smart Treadmill (£TBC, uk.wahoofitness.com), has a ‘revolutionary’ new sensing system called RunFree Mode, which allows you to change pace without touching the controls. With RunFree Mode, a high-speed motor reacts in milliseconds to your position on the running surface, allowing natural and confident pace changes – without any interaction with the console. With tilting functionality, you can also automatically level the Kickr Run.…

While sci-fi books and movies have been exploring the idea of artificial intelligence for many decades, in the last year AI has been thrust front and centre into the tech that we make use of every day. We’re now in a brave new world of AI, and there’s no going back. The biggest catalysts for the way AI has exploded into the public consciousness have no doubt been ChatGPT and Dall-E, both developed by OpenAI: AI engines trained on vast volumes of writings and imagery, able to produce text and art that at times are almost indistinguishable from what a human being would come up with. The ease with which these tools can be used, and the huge scope of their abilities, has made them two of the hottest properties…

HOW WE TEST In T3, we feature only the finest gadgets out there, and we believe that you – our loyal reader – deserve only the best tech in your life. We don’t want you to waste time, and money, on inferior products, and that’s exactly why our Tested section exists. In here you’ll find only the latest and hottest tech. Each product has been handpicked and tested by T3’s experts. We only choose people with specialist knowledge for each test, so you know you’re going to get an outcome based on many years of experience in their respective field. As well as our traditional five-star rating system (right), we also give out awards to particularly exceptional gadgets, using the line-up below - so when you spot one of these,…

The Bose Ultra Open Earbuds are earbuds that don’t actually go into one’s ears at all. They’re also earbuds that don’t isolate – quite the opposite, in fact, as environmental sound is purposefully allowed to pass through at all times. But are they the best all-time earbuds for those of a niche audio persuasion? The Bose Ultra Open Earbuds aren’t exactly awash with features that you’ll often find in pricey competitor headphones. But that’s because many features, such as ANC, would simply unravel the whole point of a product such as this. For us it’s the Ultra Open Earbuds’ design that truly sells them. If you dislike earbuds probing your ear canals, the way Bose has designed these ’buds is a true accomplishment. There’s no aggressive hook or clip to…

The Surface Laptop Studio 2 is Microsoft’s latest laptop for designers and content creators. What makes it so designer-y? Like the original, the sequel has a hinge that folds forwards, letting you position it like a drawing board, or a 16-inch graphics tablet. At first glance the Surface Laptop Studio 2 appears a dead ringer for a MacBook Pro. There are endless fields of anodised aluminium, a pleasantly minimal look when you sit back with the laptop out in front of you. But start playing around and you realise the Surface Laptop Studio 2 is nothing like a MacBook. A light prod at the top of the screen lets you tilt the lower part forwards to rest with its bottom sitting just above the touchpad. Or you can go further…

Sitting in the brand new VW ID.7 is a very pleasant experience. This long-wheel-base electric car is the company’s new flagship model and is ideal for longer commutes and distant business meetings, thanks to its spacious interior and nearly 400 miles of range. Perhaps the most striking feature of this new EV, however, is the updated OS on the 15-inch central display. This has been redesigned to offer a simpler user interface with lots of customisation and a new voice assistant too. As default, there are two main home screens that you can swipe between on the OS. Both of these screens can be customised, and you can have up to five pages on the system at any one time. It means you could have different screens for different drivers,…

With warmer and brighter days on the horizon, it’s time to start upgrading your garden to fully embrace outdoor cooking and al fresco dining this year. And what better way to do that than by investing in a pizza oven?! Having a pizza oven in your garden is the gateway into authentic and delicious tasting pizza that’s head and shoulders above the frozen versions you can find at the supermarket. One of today’s best pizza oven manufacturers is Gozney. Best known for its iconic Dome pizza oven, Gozney has since expanded its portfolio with its new Arc collection. The Gozney Arc range features the Arc (£599, gozney.com) and Arc XL (£699), which Gozney is calling its ‘most advanced pizza ovens yet’. Designed for beginner pizza makers and experts alike, the…

RETURNING TO MONKEY ISLAND Noclip’s latest long-form doc, available on YouTube, is a lovely interview-packed look at the making of one of GaGu’s favourite games of recent times. THE MARVELS Guru is not going to make any kind of statement about whether this is any good or complete tripe. That’s for you to decide, if you can bring yourself to watch it now on Disney+. BEVERLY HILLS COP: AXEL F Big, dumb, funny action movies are back. Sure, you’ll have to wait till July to see Eddie Murphy reprise his classic role on Netflix, but get excited now.…

Able to cast huge images from just a few metres, this quartet of compact portable projectors have the power to transform the way you watch movies, stream TV shows or play games. Why restrict yourself to the humble TV, when you can turn any wall into a giant display, or stage your own drive-in during balmy summer nights? The Anker Nebula Mars 3 Air is a powerful portable that has Google TV built in. Running it a close second for portability is the Xgimi Elfin. The Samsung Freestyle 2nd generation is small and light, but it’s not short on advanced features. Then the Optoma ML1080ST packs a lot of picture power into a pocket-friendly chassis. BEST HOME CINEMA PROJECTOR OPTOMA ML1080ST The Optoma ML1080ST is the brightest of our portable…

Ever since the 2016 launch of its LS50 Wireless stereo speaker system, KEF has been knocking it out of the park. And now there’s this, the LSX II LT. It’s a pared-back, more affordable variation on the LSX theme. But has the company managed to move downmarket without, you know… moving downmarket? The LSX II LT utilises the same 11th-gen speaker driver as fitted to the LSX II. A 19mm aluminium dome tweeter is positioned at the acoustic centre of a 115mm magnesium/aluminium mid/bass cone – the idea is to precisely position the acoustic centre of each unit in order to optimise time-alignment. Each speaker gets 100 watts of Class D power and frequency response is a claimed 54Hz - 28kHz. At a neat 240 x 155 x 180mm per…

If you’re a professional drone pilot with a raft of real estate and TV commissions under your belt, you’ll likely want to buy the DJI Mavic 3 Pro. But if you’re an ordinary person who takes high-quality 4K aerial videos and high-res still images so you can share the results with family and friends, the DJI Mini 4 Pro’s amazing camera is more than good enough for your needs. The newish DJI Mini 4 Pro is stockier in stature than its stablemate the Mini 3 Pro but most of this is to do with the Mini 4’s new omnidirectional sensors, which give the drone a comical bug-eyed appearance. Both drones weigh in at a featherlight 249 grams. Although not very noticeable to the naked eye, the Mini 4 Pro is…