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Monday, November 1, 2021

The best early Black Friday tech deals we've found so far

November has begun with a bang when it comes to tech deals. A whole slew of early Black Friday deals are available right now, making it a good time to cross some items off your gift list. Unsurprisingly, Amazon and Best Buy are the places to go for the best tech deals right now. Some of our favorite headphones and earbuds have hit record-low prices, and there are bunch of discounts on everything from smartwatches to OLED TVs to Instant Pots. Here are the best early Black Friday tech deals you can get right now.

Sony WH-1000XM4

Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones
Billy Steele / Engadget

Our favorite pair of Sony headphones, the WH-1000XM4, are down to a record low of $248 right now. We gave these cans a score of 94 for their powerful ANC, immersive sound quality and multi-device connectivity.

Buy WH-1000XM4 at Amazon - $248Buy WH-1000XM4 at Best Buy - $248

Sony WF-1000XM4

Sony totally overhauled its true wireless earbuds with a new design, more powerful noise cancellation, improved battery life and more. However, the choice to change to foam tips leads to an awkward fit that could be an issue for some people. The M4 is also more expensive than its predecessor, which wouldn’t be a big deal if fit wasn’t a concern.
Billy Steele/Engadget

Sony's excellent WF-1000XM4 earbuds are down to $248 during this sale. We gave them a score of 86 for their great sound quality, powerful ANC and improved battery life.

Buy WF-1000XM4 at Amazon - $248Buy WF-1000XM4 at Best Buy - $248

Sony WF-1000XM3

Sony WF-1000XM3 earbuds
Billy Steele/Engadget

The Sony WF-1000XM3 earbuds are down to $128, or more than $70 off their usual price. We gave these buds a score of 89 for their excellent sound quality, great battery life and comprehensive companion app.

Buy WF-1000XM3 at Amazon - $128Buy WF-1000XM3 at Best Buy - $128

Bose QuietComfort earbuds

Bose QuietComfort earbuds
Billy Steele / Engadget

Bose's QuietComfort earbuds are down to $199, which is a record low. These are some of the company's best true wireless earbuds and they earned a score of 87 from us for their clear sound, powerful ANC and comfortable size.

Buy QuietComfort earbuds at Amazon - $199Buy QuietComfort earbuds at Best Buy - $199

Instant Pot Duo Plus (6-quart)

Instant Pot Duo Plus 9-in-1
Instant Pot

The Instant Pot Duo Plus dropped down to its all-time-low price of $60. This multicooker has functions for pressure cooking, slow cooking, yogurt making, sous vide and more, and its six-quart capacity should make enough food for four to six people people.

Buy Instant Pot Duo Plus at Best Buy - $60

Jabra Elite 85t

Jabra Elite 85t earbuds
Engadget

Jabra's Elite 85t earbuds are on sale for a new record-low price of $150, which is $80 off its normal price. These earbuds impressed us with their strong ANC, comfortable size and wireless charging case.

Buy Elite 85t at Amazon - $150Buy Elite 85t at Best Buy - $150

JLab Go Air Pop

JLab Go Air Pop
JLab

JLab's already affordable Go Air Pop earbuds are down to only $13 right now. These colorful true wireless buds sport an eight-hour battery life, a small and comfortable design and touch controls.

Buy Go Air Pop at Best Buy - $13

Samsung Galaxy Watch 4

A black Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 on a wrist
David Imel for Engadget

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 is on sale for $200 right now, which is a new record low. The Watch 4 Classic is also on sale for $320. These remain the best smartwatches for Android users and we gave the Watch 4 a score of 85 for its bright screen, comprehensive health tracking and improved third-party app support.

Buy Galaxy Watch 4 at Best Buy - $200Buy Watch 4 Classic at Amazon - $320Buy Watch 4 Classic at Best Buy - $320

Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 and S7+

Galaxy Tab S7 and S7+
Cherlynn Low / Engadget

Samsung's Tab S7 and S7+ are down to $500 and $700, respectively, during this sale. We gave these Android tablets a score of 80 for their lovely build, striking 120Hz displays and long battery life.

Buy Galaxy Tab S7 at Amazon - $500Buy Galaxy Tab S7 at Best Buy - $500Buy Galaxy Tab S7+ at Amazon - $700Buy Galaxy Tab S7+ at Best Buy - $700

Google Nest Audio

Google Nest Audio smart speaker sitting on a wooden tablet next to a green plant, against a blue wall.
Engadget

Google's Nest Audio is down to an all-time low of $60. This is one of the best smart speakers you can get, especially if you already use the Google Assistant. We gave it a score of 87 for its solid audio quality, attractive design and good performance.

Buy Nest Audio at Best Buy - $60

Google Nest Hub (2nd gen)

Google Nest Hub 2021 (2nd gen) photo. Picture of Google's newest smart display on a nightstand.
Cherlynn Low / Engadget

The latest Nest Hub is half off, bringing it down to only $50. It earned a score of 89 from us for its speedy performance, clearer and louder audio and accurate sleep tracking sensor.

Buy Nest Hub (2nd gen) at Best Buy - $50

Google Nest Hub Max

Google Nest Hub Max
Engadget

The Nest Hub Max is on sale for $180 right now. This is the biggest version of Google's smart display and we gave it a score of 86 for its excellent sound quality, great display and handy gesture controls.

Buy Nest Hub Max at Best Buy - $180

Google Nest WiFi

Google Nest WiFi and access point.
Daniel Cooper

Google's Nest WiFi system with one router and one access point is on sale for $180. We gave this mesh system a score of 84 for its lovely hardware, simple installation process and built-in smart speaker capabilities.

Buy Nest WiFi at Best Buy - $180

55-inch LG G1 OLED smart TV

55-inch LG G1 OLED evo 4K TV
LG

A 55-inch LG G1 OLED TV will set you back $1,700 if you grab it during this sale. It's part of the "gallery" series and it uses OLED evo panel technology, which provides better brightness and clearer whites than standard OLED displays. It also runs on LG's a9 Gen4 AI Processor 4K and supports features like G-SYNC, FreeSync, OLED Motion Pro and voice commands via Alexa and the Google Assistant.

Buy 55-inch LG G1 evo OLED at Amazon - $1,699Buy 55-inch LG G1 evo OLED at Best Buy - $1,699

48-inch LG A1 OLED smart TV

55-inch LG A1 OLED 4K TV
LG

The latest LG OLED lineup just became available a few months ago and now you can grab the 48-inch A1 model for $900. The A1 series is the most affordable of the bunch, making these sets good options for anyone looking to upgrade to OLED while on a tight budget.

Buy 48-inch LG A1 OLED at Amazon - $900Buy 48-inch LG A1 OLED at Best Buy - $900

55-inch Vizio OLED smart TV

Vizio OLED TV
Vizio

Vizio's 55-inch OLED 4K TV is down to $1,000 right now, or $300 off its normal price. This set supports HDR and Dolby Vision, DTS Virtual X surround sound audio and AirPlay and Chromecast technology built in.

Buy 55-inch Vizio OLED at Best Buy - $1,000

Lenovo Smart Clock Essential

Lenovo Smart Clock Essential
Nicole Lee / Engadget

Lenovo's Smart Clock Essential is $20 off, bringing it down to $30. We gave this compact smart alarm clock a score of 83 for its minimalistic design, built-in nightlight, tap-to-snooze feature and good smart home controls.

Buy Smart Clock Essential at Best Buy - $30

Lenovo Smart Clock Gen 2 with Dock

Off angle view of a gray Lenovo Smart Clock 2 on a wireless charging dock with its screen facing the camera. In the background sits a blue Smart Clock 2 and a row of tablets.
Cherlynn Low / Engadget

The new Smart Clock Gen 2 is on sale for $70, or $20 off its normal price. This model has a better processor plus a wireless charging pad that you can use to juice up your smartphone, earbuds or other devices.

Buy Smart Clock Gen 2 at Best Buy - $70

Amazon Echo

Amazon Echo (2020)
Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Amazon's latest Echo smart speaker has been discounted to $60, which is a new record low. We gave the orb-shaped device a score of 89 for its good audio quality, solid Alexa performance and stereo pairing option.

Buy Echo at Amazon - $60Buy Echo at Best Buy - $60

Amazon Echo Show 8

The previous-gen Echo Show 8 has fallen to $60 in this sale. While it doesn't have the improved video camera that the new version does, it's still a good option if you're looking for a mid-sized smart display to put in your kitchen, office or elsewhere in your home.

Buy Echo Show 8 (previous gen) at Amazon - $60Buy Echo Show 8 (previous gen) at Best Buy - $60

Amazon Kindle

Amazon Kindle
Engadget

The base Kindle is $40 off, bringing it down to a new low of $50. That's a great deal if you don't need the bells and whistles that come with the new Paperwhite edition. We gave the Kindle a score of 91 for its front-lit display, improved contrast panel and sleeker design.

Buy Kindle at Amazon - $50Buy Kindle at Best Buy - $50

Eero Pro 6

Eero Pro 6
Amazon / Eero

The Eero Pro 6 mesh WiFi three-pack is just about $150 off, bringing it down to an all-time low of $449. This pack can cover 6,000 square feet, supports WiFi 6, has a speedy setup process and works with Alexa.

Buy Eero Pro 6 at Amazon - $449Buy Eero Pro 6 at Best Buy - $449

Facebook Portal

Nicole Lee / Engadget

Facebook's Portal smart display is on sale for $80, or $100 off its normal price. We gave it a score of 79 for its HD display, smart camera tracking, bevy of video chat features and good sound quality.

Buy Facebook Portal at Amazon - $80Buy Facebook Portal at Best Buy - $80

Facebook Portal TV

LG updates its TVs to work better with Facebook Portal TV video calling
Engadget

The Portal TV has been discounted by $70, bringing it down to $80. This device basically turns your TV into a giant video chat screen and we gave it a score of 78 for its smart camera tracking and immersive video chat experience.

Buy Portal TV at Amazon - $80Buy Portal TV at Best Buy - $80

Fitbit Sense

Fitbit Sense
Cherlynn Low / Engadget

The Fitbit Sense is back down to its record low of $200. This is the company's most capable smartwatch and it earned a score of 82 from us for its big, sharp display and comprehensive health tracking features.

Buy Fitbit Sense at Amazon - $200Buy Fitbit Sense at Best Buy - $200

Fitbit Inspire 2

Fitbit Inspire 2 fitness tracker
Fitbit

The Fitbit Inspire 2 tracker is down to a record low of $60 right now. This is one of the Fitbit bands to get if you want a device that lasts up to 10 days on a single charge while tracking daily activity, steps and sleep.

Buy Inspire 2 at Amazon - $60Buy Inspire 2 at Best Buy - $60

Logitech C922 Pro webcam

Logitech C922 Pro
Logitech

Logitech's C922 Pro webcam has been discounted to $80, or $20 off its normal price. Recording in up to 1080p/60fps, this webcam is a good one if you want just one gadget for both Zoom calls and game streaming.

Buy C922 Pro webcam at Best Buy - $80

Razer BlackWidow V2 Tournament Edition

Razer BlackWidow V2 Tournament Edition
Razer

This Razer mechanical keyboard is on sale for $80, which is $60 off its normal price. It boasts programmable backlit keys, anti-ghosting with 10-key rollover and an included wrist rest.

Buy BlackWidow V2 Tournament edition at Best Buy - $80

Nanoleaf Hexagon starter kit

Nanoleaf Hexagon starter kit
Nanoleaf

Nanoleaf's Hexagon pack is down to $170, or $30 off its normal price. You can hang these up in your own, unique pattern and they can shine in over 16 million colors. The companion app allows you to create scenes, set schedules and program the lights to change with music you may be playing.

Buy Nanoleaf Hexagon pack at Best Buy - $170

Segway ES2-N electric scooter

Segway Ninebot ES2-N scooter
Segway

Best Buy slashed $250 off the Ninebot ES2-N electric scooter, bringing it down to $400. This foldable scooter uses 700W of power to reach a max speed of 15.5mph, and its non-pneumatic tires keep you stable even on rough terrain. It also has a built-in headlight for safer riding in the evening and an LED display that shows speed and battery level.

Buy ES2-N scooter at Best Buy - $400

Get the latest Black Friday and Cyber Monday offers by visiting our deals homepage and following @EngadgetDeals on Twitter.



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Google confirms Pixel 6 Pro display flickering issue will be fixed next month

Google's Pixel launches have been often been marred by hardware and other problems, with some more serious than others. The Pixel 6 has avoided that trend so far, but it still has a few minor issues around the display, 9to5Google has reported. Users noticed that when the Pixel 6 Pro is off, pressing the power button with slight pressure (not enough to turn it on) seems to activate a strange display "flicker." This doesn't affect the device when it's on.

In a support document, Google acknowledged the issue and said it will be fixed in the December software update. In the meantime, it gave the following instructions: "To avoid seeing this, when the power is off, do not cycle the power button. When you want to use the phone, hold the power button down long enough to turn it on." Google added that it's not "an issue with the phone hardware," meaning a software update will handle the problem. 

The November patch has just been released today, with the main fix being a tweak to the Internet Quick Settings panel. As such, it'll take another month or so to fix the flickering issues. With the Pixel 6 being Google's first smartphone with its own Tensor processor, hopefully we won't see any major hardware issues. 



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Apple's new AirPods Pro with MagSafe are down to $190 at Best Buy

Apple only rolled out the MagSafe charging case option for the AirPods Pro wireless earbuds just two weeks ago, but they've already going on sale for a second time. Today, they're available for at Best Buy for just $190, down $60 (24 percent) from the regular $250 price. We expect Amazon will match this price soon, but for now, the online retailer has the earbuds for $200, just $10 more.

Buy Apple AirPods Pro at Best Buy - $190

The AirPods Pro earned a solid Engadget score of 87, thanks to the improved sound quality, good active noise cancellation, IPX4 water resistance, improved fit for more ear sizes and always-on Siri access. They also offer touch controls that let you easily switch modes between, say, noise cancellation and "Transparency" mode that lets you hear conversations, street noise and more. 

However, Apple device compatibility is the most attractive feature compared to, say, Sony's WF-1000XM4 wireless earphones. That allows you to rapidly switch between an iPhone, iPad and MacBook computer. Battery life is as high as 5 hours without ANC or Transparency modes, or 4.5 hours of listening time (3.5 hours of talk time) with ANC turned on. 

As part of its new AirPods and MacBook Pro launch, Apple gave the AirPods Pro a MagSafe charging case. As before, the case has a built-in battery that allows you to go up to 24 hours without needing access to a wall plug. MagSafe makes charging a bit more convenient, though, as the case will magnetically stick to compatible chargers like Apple's own MagSafe puck.

The $190 Best Buy price makes the AirPods Pro with MagSafe nearly as cheap as we've ever seen the older AirPods Pro without MagSafe. They'll probably keep going on sale fairly often as they've been out now since late 2019 and a new model could be coming down the pipe fairly soon. 

Get the latest Black Friday and Cyber Monday offers by visiting our deals homepage and following @EngadgetDeals on Twitter.



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Facebook is enabling a new generation of touchy-feely robots

Without a sense of touch, Frankenstein’s monster would never have realized that “fire bad” and we would have had an unstoppable reanimated killing machine on our hands. So be thankful for the most underappreciated of your five senses, one that robots may soon themselves enjoy. Facebook announced on Monday that it has developed a suite of tactile technologies that will impart a sense of touch into robots that the mad doctor could never imagine.

But why is Facebook even bothering to look into robotics research at all? “Before I joined Facebook, I was chatting with Mark Zuckerberg, and I asked him, ‘Is there any area related to AI that you think we shouldn't be working on?’ Yann LeCun, Facebook’s chief AI scientist recalled during a recent press call. “And he said, ‘I can't find any good reason for us to work on robotics,’ so that was the start of our FAIR [Facebook AI Research] research, that we're not going to work on robotics.”

“Then, after a few years,” he continued, “it became clear that a lot of interesting progress in AI work is happening in the context of robotics because this is the nexus of where people in AI research are trying to get to; the full loop of perception, reasoning, planning and action, and then getting feedback from the from the environment.”

As such, FAIR has centered its tactile technology research on four main areas of study — hardware, simulation, processing and perception. We’ve already seen FAIR’s hardware efforts: the DIGIT, a “low-cost, compact high-resolution tactile sensor” that Facebook first announced in 2020. Unlike conventional tactile sensors, which typically rely on capacitive or resistive methods, DIGIT is actually vision-based.

DIGIT world view
FAIR

“Inside the sensors there is a camera, there are RGB LEDs placed around the silicon, and then there is a silicon gel,” Facebook AI Research Scientist, Roberto Calandra, explained. “Whenever we touch the silicone on an object, this is going to create shadows or changes in color cues that are then recorded by the collar. These allow [DIGIT] to have extremely high resolution and extremely high spectral sensitivity while having a device which is mechanically very robust, and very easy and cheap to produce.”

Calandra noted that DIGIT costs about $15 to produce and, being open source hardware, its production schematics are available to universities and research institutions with fabrication capabilities. It’s also available for sale, thanks to a partnership with GelSight, to researchers (and even members of the public) who can’t build their own.

digit egg
FAIR

In terms of simulation, which allows ML systems to train in a virtual environment without the need to collect heaps of real-world hardware data (much the same way Waymo has refined its self-driving vehicle systems over the course of 10 billion computer generated miles), FAIR has developed TACTO. This system can generate hundreds of frames of realistic high-resolution touch readings per second as well as simulate vision-based tactile sensors like DIGIT so that researchers don’t have to spend hours upon hours tapping on sensors to create a compendium of real-world training data.

“Today if you want to use reinforcement learning, for example, to train a car to drive itself,” LeCun pointed out, “it would have to it would have to be done in your turn environment because it would have to drive for millions of hours, cause you know countless thousands of accidents and destroy itself multiple times before it burns its way around and even then it probably wouldn't be very reliable. So how is it that humans are capable of learning to drive a car with 10 to 20 hours of practice with hardly any supervision?”

“It's because, by the time we turn 16 or 17, we have a pretty good model of the world,” he continued. We inherently understand the implications of what would happen if we drove a car off a cliff because we’ve had nearly two decades of experience with the concept of gravity as well as that of fucking around and finding out. “So ‘how to get machines to learn that model of the world that allows them to predict events and plan what's going to happen as a consequence of their actions’ is really the crux of the problem here.”

Sensors and simulators are all well and good, assuming you’ve got an advanced Comp Sci degree and a deep understanding of ML training procedure. But many aspiring roboticists don’t have those sorts of qualifications so, in order to broaden the availability of DIGIT and TACTO, FAIR has developed PyTouch — not to be confused with PyTorch. While Torch is a machine learning library focusing primarily on vision-based and NLP libraries, PyTouch centers on touch sensing applications.

“Researchers can simply connect their DIGIT, download a pretrained model and use this as a building block in their robotic application,” Calandra and Facebook AI Hardware Engineer, Mike Lambeta, wrote in a blog published Monday. “For example, to build a controller that grasps objects, researchers could detect whether the controller’s fingers are in contact by downloading a module from PyTouch.”

Most recently, FAIR (in partnership with Carnegie Mellon University) has developed ReSkin, a touch-sensitive “skin” for robots and wearables alike. “This deformable elastomer has micro-magnetic particles in it,” Facebook AI Research Manager, Abhinav Gupta, said. “And then we have electronics — a thin flexible PCB, which is essentially a grid of magnetometers. The sensing technology behind the skin is very simple: if you apply force into it, the elastomer will deform and, as it deforms, it changes the magnetic flux which is read [by] magnetometers.”

“A generalized tactile sensing skin like ReSkin will provide a source of rich contact data that could be helpful in advancing AI in a wide range of touch-based tasks including object classification, proprioception, and robotic grasping,” Gupta wrote in a recent FAIR blog. “AI models trained with learned tactile sensing skills will be capable of many types of tasks, including those that require higher sensitivity, such as working in health care settings, or greater dexterity, such as maneuvering small, soft, or sensitive objects.”

Despite being relatively inexpensive to produce — 100 units cost about $6 to make — ReSkin is surprisingly durable. The 2-3mm thick material lasts for up to 50,000 touches while generating high-frequency, 3-axis tactile signals and while retaining a temporal resolution of up to 400Hz and a spatial resolution of 1mm with 90 percent accuracy. Once a swath of ReSkin reaches its usable limits, replacing “the skin is as easy as taking a bandaid off and putting a new bandaid on,” Gupta quipped.

ReSkin Berry
FAIR

Given these properties, FAIR researchers foresee ReSkin being used in a number of applications including in-hand manipulation, ie making sure that robot gripper doesn’t crush the egg it’s picking up; measuring tactile forces in the field, measuring how much force the human hand exerts on objects it is manipulating, and contact localization, essentially teaching robots to recognize what they’re reaching for and how much pressure to apply once they touch upon it.

As with virtually all of its earlier research, FAIR has open-sourced DIGIT, TACTO, PyTouch and ReSkin in an effort to advance the state of tactile art across the entire field.



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The Morning After: So what is the metaverse?

So what is the metaverse? The big tech news last week was that Facebook — the company — is renaming itself Meta, which will apparently align it with its future goals and aims.

But what does it even mean? Judging from Mark Zuckerberg’s keynote, it’s definitely about “experiences.” Meta’s take on the metaverse is “a new phase of interconnected virtual experiences using technologies like virtual and augmented reality.”

Other things that have been described as metaverse include: Snow Crash (where the term originates), Ready Player One, Second Life, The Matrix universe. Both Roblox and Fortnite even touch on a lot of the major points of the metaverse. Senior Editor Daniel Cooper tries to detangle Zuckerberg’s view of his business’ future, right here.

— Mat Smith

‘Roblox’ returns after three-day outage

The company didn't pinpoint the cause until just hours earlier.

The gaming platform's developer said it was "incrementally" bringing regions back to service after having pinpointed the cause roughly three hours earlier. Some had blamed the outage on a Chipotle promo that launched half an hour before the failure. Roblox has over 40 million daily users. Maybe they really like burritos? The company, while it didn't detail the cause, has ruled out particular "experiences or partnerships."

Continue reading.

NASA delays SpaceX Crew-3 launch to November 3rd

It’ll be a late start.

NASA has delayed the launch of Crew-3 from early on Halloween to 1:10 AM ET on November 3rd. The agency pinned the setback on "unfavorable" weather. There probably won't be another delay, though. Officials say there’s an 80 percent chance of good weather for the new date. Live coverage of the launch on NASA's channel will start November 2nd at 8:45 PM ET.

Continue reading.

Juno probe shows the first 3D view of Jupiter's atmosphere

Giant cyclones.

TMA
NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS, Gerald Eichstädt and Sean Doran (CC BY-NC-SA)

​​Researchers have produced the first 3D view of Jupiter's atmospheric layers, showing in greater detail than before how its turbulent clouds and storms work. Most notably, it's clearer how its giant cyclones and anticyclones behave. They're much taller than expected, with the Great Red Spot (an anticyclone) running 200 miles deep.

Continue reading.

Apple's mixed reality headset might play 'high-quality' VR games

The headset could still launch as soon as 2022.

Bloomberg's Mark Gurman claimed Apple is aiming for a headset with both fast chips and high-res displays that can handle "high-quality" VR games. While it's not certain just what chips would be involved, a previous leak mentioned a possible 8K resolution per eye.

The headset is still poised to arrive "as early as" 2022, Gurman said. He also suggested Apple would eventually follow up the mixed headset with an augmented-reality-only model, but that was "years down the road."

Apple has acquired companies and reportedly shuffled executives with mixed reality in mind. And you know what this means? Apple might dabble in the metaverse, too.

Continue reading.

Lenovo's rumored 17-inch ThinkBook Plus has a second screen for drawing

You could scribble without obscuring the main display.

TMA
Evan Blass

Well-known device leaker Evan Blass has shared what he said is an image of a 17-inch ThinkBook Plus model, and it includes a secondary screen that appears to work with a stylus. The 17-inch ThinkBook Plus seems to have an extra-wide main display and fit in a full keyboard along with a large trackpad.

Continue reading.

 

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'5D' storage could fit 500TB on a CD-sized glass disc

Using high-speed lasers, researchers have created "5D" data storage technology that could allow 500 TB of data to be written to a CD-sized glass disc, according to the Optica society. The technique uses higher writing speeds that might finally make it feasible to use the technology for archival and other purposes. 

With 5D optical storage, each file is uses three layers of nanoscale dots. The dots' size, orientation and position within the three standard dimensions, make up the five "dimensions." The dots change the polarization of light travelling through the disc which is read using a microscope and polarizer.

We've seen 5D optical storage before, but there were a number of problems — particularly the slow writing speeds that made the technology impractical. It has huge upsides for (extremely) long-term storage, though. It's been estimated that the storage medium could withstand temperatures up to 1,000 degrees C and last 13.8 billion years at room temperature without degrading.  

To overcome the speed problem, researchers used a femtosecond laser with a high repetition rate. Rather than writing directly in the glass, they used the laser to produce a phenomenon called near-field enhancement, that creates tiny structures using a few weak light pulses. Those can be used to enhance the circular voids generated by a more powerful, single-pulse "micro-explosion." This technique "minimized the thermal damage that has been problematic for other approaches that use high-repetition-rate lasers," according to the paper.

Using the new technique, the team was able to write 5GB of text data ono a silica glass disc the size of a conventional CD with nearly 100 percent readout accuracy. "With the writing density available from the method, the disc would be able to hold 500 terabytes of data," the researchers said. They were also able to write at speeds or around a million voxels per second, or about 230 KB per second. 

That might sound slow, but by introducing parallel writing, you could feasibly fill a 500TB disc in about 60 days. That could provide a way to backup reams of valuable data, essentially forever. "With the current system, we have the ability to preserve terabytes of data, which could be used, for example, to preserve information from a person’s DNA," said research team leader Peter G. Kazansky.



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Google's Nest devices are on sale on Best Buy ahead of Black Friday

If you want to score Google's Nest devices at a discount before Black Friday arrives, check out Best Buy's sale — some of them are even available for the lowest price we've seen them sell for across retailers. The Google Nest Audio, for instance, is now listed for $60, which is $40 less than its standard price and is the lowest we've seen for the speaker. In case you missed the chance to purchase the device at that price from B&H Photo in October, here's another chance to do so. The second-gen Google Nest Hub is also on sale for $50, which is only $10 more than what the first-gen Nest Hub goes for these days.

Buy Google Nest Audio at Best Buy - $60Buy Google Nest Hub 2nd Gen at Best Buy - $50

We gave the Nest Audio a score of 87 in our review and called it a steal at $100. The smart speaker offers much better audio quality than Google's older speaker models, which can be improved further if you pair two of them in stereo. We also praised it for its attractive minimalist design: The device is fully covered in audio-transparent cloth that comes in five colors. Meanwhile, we gave the second-gen Nest Hub a score of 89, praising it for having a louder and clearer display than its predecessor. Assistant also responds faster on the smart display than on its first-gen counterpart, thanks to its onboard chip. 

Want a bigger screen? The Nest Hub Max, with its 10-inch display and camera, is on sale for $180, down $50 from its normal price of $230. We gave it a score of 86 in our review and praised it for its great screen, gesture control capability for media playback and ability to double as a Nest Cam. The Google Nest WiFi 2-pack, which comes with a mesh WiFi router and an access point, is also currently on sale for $179. That's $89 less than the two-pack's usual price. The router and the single access point can cover up to 3,800 square feet, and the point comes with a built-in smart speaker with access to Google Assistant.

Buy Google Nest WiFi Mesh Router 2-Pack at Best Buy - $179Buy Google Nest Hub Max at Best Buy - $180

If you want a Google's smaller smart speakers instead of the bigger Nest Audio to place around your home, the Nest Mini is also on sale for $25, down 50 percent from its original price of $50. It may not sound as good as the Nest Audio, but it has better audio quality than its predecessor. Meanwhile, the Nest Doorbell Battery is down $50 from its original price of $180. As its name implies, it's a battery-powered video doorbell that's easy to install and can send you alerts about important activity outside your door. Finally, the Nest Smart Programmable Wifi Thermostat is on sale for $100, down $30 from its original price. It was designed to be easy to install and has a touch bar on the side you can use to adjust the temperature. You can also control it from anywhere via the Google Home app or via Google Assistant.

Buy Google Nest Mini at Best Buy - $25Buy Google Nest Doorbell Battery at Best Buy - $130Buy Google Nest Smart Programmable Wifi Thermostat at Best Buy - $100

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