Speaker 1: Samsung unveils the Galaxy Note ten, plus a watch, a laptop,
Speaker 1: and more. Disney teases a killer bundle, Amazon has a
Speaker 1: music deal for students, and new Verizon plans guaranteed to
Speaker 1: confuse you. Plus I'm answering your pressing tech questions. What's
Speaker 1: going on? I'm Rich Demiro. This is Rich on Tech,
Speaker 1: the podcast where I talk about the stuff I think
Speaker 1: you should know about happening in the tech world. It's
Speaker 1: also the place where I answer the tech questions you
Speaker 1: send me, whether it's through email, my website, Facebook, Instagram,
Speaker 1: DM however you get in touch with me, I answer
Speaker 1: your questions right here in the show. I'm coming to
Speaker 1: you now from Brooklyn, where I just got out of
Speaker 1: the Samsung event. It's a rainy day here in Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: but it was a good show and fun to see
Speaker 1: what the company unveiled. Producer Megan meanwhile is on vacation
Speaker 1: in Hawaii. She will be joining us on the next show.
Speaker 1: So the show must go on here from New York.
Speaker 1: And let's just start with samsung big event here at
Speaker 1: the Barclay Center in Brooklyn, where the company unveiled the
Speaker 1: Galaxy Note ten. There's been lots of leaks about the phone,
Speaker 1: but now we know officially.
Speaker 2: What the device is all about.
Speaker 1: Plus I had a chance to go hands on with
Speaker 1: the device last week up in San Francisco, and it's
Speaker 1: a good looking.
Speaker 2: Device, it really is.
Speaker 1: They did a very nice job on the design of
Speaker 1: the Note ten, and for the first time ever, there
Speaker 1: are actually two sizes of the Note ten, and if
Speaker 1: you're counting for reels, there's kind of like three of
Speaker 1: these devices because there's a Note ten, there's a Note
Speaker 1: ten Plus, which has a bigger screen, and then there's
Speaker 1: a Note ten plus five G say all that three
Speaker 1: times fast, so quickly breaking it down, the Note ten
Speaker 1: is the standard model, which has a six point three
Speaker 1: inch screen. The Note ten Plus has a six point
Speaker 1: eight inch screen. It just seems like if you add
Speaker 1: up all these devices that Samsung has, between the S
Speaker 1: ten and the Note ten and all of their lower phones,
Speaker 1: they have a lot to choose from, and it just
Speaker 1: seems like they are making something for everyone, no matter
Speaker 1: what your price range is or what features you want.
Speaker 1: Spoiler alert, there is one feature that is gone from
Speaker 1: the Note ten lineup, and that is the headphone jack.
Speaker 1: So there is no more headphone jack on both the
Speaker 1: Note ten or the Note ten plus. Some of you
Speaker 1: will be sad about that, and I'm kind of mixed.
Speaker 1: I use Bluetooth headphones ninety nine percent of the time,
Speaker 1: but there are those random times when it would be
Speaker 1: nice to just be able to plug in something to
Speaker 1: your phone. But we're not here to debate whether that's
Speaker 1: coming back or going away forever. But I think it's
Speaker 1: pretty much gone forever. If you look at the front
Speaker 1: of these devices, they are just beautiful, and the back
Speaker 1: they have this great display that just goes truly edge
Speaker 1: to edge. They really push the boundaries of just how
Speaker 1: far these screens can go to the edges. And the
Speaker 1: only thing that's really interrupting the front screen on the
Speaker 1: Notes is a tiny selfie cam on the front. So
Speaker 1: you've got that ten megapixel camera on the front, and
Speaker 1: then on the back you've got a three camera array,
Speaker 1: which is a wide angle lens, a standard lens, and
Speaker 1: then a telephoto lens. And it's gotten to the point
Speaker 1: where nobody even mentions the megapixels on these things because
Speaker 1: we're no longer interested in that. It either takes a
Speaker 1: good picture or it doesn't take a good picture. And
Speaker 1: these phones are taking really nice pictures. I think it's
Speaker 1: pretty much the same cameras that are on the S
Speaker 1: ten and the S ten Plus, but the big difference
Speaker 1: here on the Note ten plus, you're kind of getting
Speaker 1: everything the best. So it used to be that the
Speaker 1: Note in general was always the best that Samsung had
Speaker 1: to offer, but now it's the Note ten Plus that
Speaker 1: has the best. So on the back you get an
Speaker 1: extra depth camera and you also get more memory, so
Speaker 1: eight gigabytes RAM on the Note ten with two fifty
Speaker 1: six storage, and on the Note ten Plus there's twelve
Speaker 1: gigabytes a RAM along with two fifty six gigs of
Speaker 1: storage or five hundred and twelve. And on the Note
Speaker 1: ten plus, if you want a memory card, it's there.
Speaker 1: It is not there on the Note ten. So again
Speaker 1: they're really dividing these two devices. So some of the
Speaker 1: main features they showed off this is more of an
Speaker 1: evolution than a revolution. So they have handwriting on there.
Speaker 1: They've got the stylist. Now the handwriting converts the text
Speaker 1: really quickly and you can export it to Microsoft Word.
Speaker 1: They do these weird things with the spen, which are
Speaker 1: actions which you can wave it around in the air
Speaker 1: and control things on your phone, kind of like before,
Speaker 1: except way more. I don't think anyone's gonna use that,
Speaker 1: to be honest. The video stuff is really cool, so
Speaker 1: if you're a video editor you're creating videos. They did
Speaker 1: some nice stuff there. They put a screen recorder built in,
Speaker 1: You've got a video editing app that's built in the
Speaker 1: microphone zooms in to the audio when you zoom in
Speaker 1: on the camera. And then they have this cool thing
Speaker 1: called live focus video, which is kind of like the
Speaker 1: live effect in a picture where you get that blurry background,
Speaker 1: but now they're doing that with video and that's pretty
Speaker 1: impressive as well. There's also some cool things where you
Speaker 1: can doodle on someone in three D and it shows
Speaker 1: up on them.
Speaker 2: That's kind of fun.
Speaker 1: And you can also charge this The Note ten plus
Speaker 1: at least faster than ever and now supports up to
Speaker 1: forty five watts of charging, which just means that it's
Speaker 1: really fast. The thing I'm most impressed with is the color.
Speaker 1: They have this cool aura glow color which is just
Speaker 1: so cool. It reminds me of when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: we had these stickers that were they kind of reflected
Speaker 1: the light in like a rainbow. They were like silver,
Speaker 1: and they reflected the light iridescent kind of thing. So
Speaker 1: they've got that color, which is really cool. They've got white,
Speaker 1: they've got black, and it's gonna be on all the
Speaker 1: major carriers on August twenty third is when it's in stores.
Speaker 2: Of course, pre orders start.
Speaker 1: Now and pricing is nine p fifty for the Note
Speaker 1: ten ten ninety nine ninety nine for the Galaxy Note
Speaker 1: ten Plus. And I love this. Whenever I'm at these events,
Speaker 1: I always round this up, so ten ninety nine becomes
Speaker 1: eleven hundred, and one of the Samsung people as I'm
Speaker 1: talking for TV is like you missed. You said eleven hundred,
Speaker 1: and I said, what do you mean, what I do wrong?
Speaker 1: He said, well, it's ten ninety nine ninety nine. I mean,
Speaker 1: come on, it's a penny more. I'm just rounding it up.
Speaker 2: As always.
Speaker 1: The best way to buy these things is really through
Speaker 1: the pre order, which you will get the best deal
Speaker 1: if you go to Samsung dot com and trade in
Speaker 1: your old phone. Of course, I'm sure the carriers will
Speaker 1: have some good deals as well. The other weird thing
Speaker 1: that Samsung's doing with these devices is they're not putting
Speaker 1: any in the hands of reviewers like myself until a
Speaker 1: week later, so we're not going to get our hands
Speaker 1: on these things for another week or so, which is
Speaker 1: kind of different because generally you get them and you
Speaker 1: start giving impressions of them immediately, but they're not doing that.
Speaker 1: So it'll be interesting to see if that theory works
Speaker 1: to sell more phones. I guess in the time that
Speaker 1: you don't really hear much about them, or I guess
Speaker 1: you don't really have much solid hands on time. All right,
Speaker 1: let's get to our first question. This comes from Janet McKinnon.
Speaker 1: Janet says, can you do a review on Anytime tv
Speaker 1: dot us? Is this better than a monthly cable bill?
Speaker 1: I understand it's just one seventy five a year, and
Speaker 1: could you do a review and email it? Can you
Speaker 1: recommend it or not? And also how to use it?
Speaker 1: Thank you, Janet. So I looked up Anytime TV dot
Speaker 1: us and I can tell you this number one. Do
Speaker 1: not even go near this thing. There are so many
Speaker 1: of these gray websites that are purporting to give free
Speaker 1: TV and thousands of channels and every premium movie channel
Speaker 1: reminds me of the just Scrambler boxes back in the day,
Speaker 1: the black boxes people still get those things now they're
Speaker 1: just using Amazon fireTV. I have not checked these things out.
Speaker 1: I looked at the list of channels that they offer
Speaker 1: on Anytime TV dot us and it's just it's every
Speaker 1: channel in the world and every movie in the world.
Speaker 1: How do you offer all that for one seventy five
Speaker 1: a year. Well, it's bogus. So stay away from these things,
Speaker 1: do not use them. They get shut down all the time.
Speaker 1: So you may pay your one to seventy five for
Speaker 1: the year and it may go under in the first week.
Speaker 1: So definitely don't do this. And also these are a
Speaker 1: lot of these things are either outright scams or all
Speaker 1: they're doing is linking to the public websites that you
Speaker 1: can stream stuff on anyway, and at the worst, they're
Speaker 1: linking to movies that are on BitTorrent sites, So you're
Speaker 1: getting stuff that is not official. It's not good, it's illegal,
Speaker 1: it's operating in a gray area. So I would stay
Speaker 1: away from these things. And I'm not just picking on
Speaker 1: this one. There's so many of them. As people are
Speaker 1: cutting the cord and they're looking for alternatives, they're looking
Speaker 1: into anything they can get that's cheaper than cable and
Speaker 1: you remember that old adage, if it sounds too good
Speaker 1: to be true, it probably is. Well, if you're paying
Speaker 1: one hundred and seventy five dollars a year, and when
Speaker 1: I used to have cable, it was one hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy five a month, something's wrong, especially when you're getting
Speaker 1: or promised every channel in the entire world world.
Speaker 2: So don't do it. Stay away.
Speaker 1: And it's not just because it's in a gray zone.
Speaker 1: It's just not good, not good at all. Let's talk
Speaker 1: more about Samsung. They also unveiled several other things at
Speaker 1: their event, including the galaxy Watch Active two. This is
Speaker 1: a new version of their smart watch that they sort
Speaker 1: of just released, I feel like very recently. But the
Speaker 1: galaxy Watch Active two is further refined, as they say,
Speaker 1: and this is the closest competitor, I'd say to the
Speaker 1: Apple Watch. There's not many smart watches that are really
Speaker 1: approaching the functionality of the Apple Watch. But the galaxy
Speaker 1: Watch Active two looks really nice and it has a
Speaker 1: lot of the features that you need. So it tracks
Speaker 1: your sleep, attracks your fitness, it even tells you when
Speaker 1: you're stressed. Out comes in two different sizes, a forty
Speaker 1: four milimeter and a forty millimeter And the main thing
Speaker 1: that's different on this is the signature rotating bezel that
Speaker 1: they have. It is now digital, so it doesn't actually
Speaker 1: physically rotate. You just kind of spin your finger around
Speaker 1: the screen to navigate on the watch, and by the way,
Speaker 1: you can navigate forward or backwards. The screen is really beautiful.
Speaker 1: I still think that the Apple Watch. The physical look
Speaker 1: of the Galaxy Watch is very nice. I think that
Speaker 1: the look on the screen is not as polished as
Speaker 1: the Apple Watch. But at the same time, if you
Speaker 1: have an Android device, especially a Samsung phone, this is
Speaker 1: going to complement it very nicely. There's also this interesting
Speaker 1: feature called my Style. You take a picture of your
Speaker 1: outfit that you're wearing, and your watch face will change
Speaker 1: to sort of match it up, which is kind of fun.
Speaker 1: It manually tracks more than thirty nine different workouts, with
Speaker 1: seven of them automatically activate it, so if you're running, walking, cycling, swimming,
Speaker 1: rowing on the elliptical, or doing a workout, dynamic workout,
Speaker 1: whatever that is, it will automatically start to track those.
Speaker 1: The rest you have to manually track, and it also
Speaker 1: tracks your real time stress levels and the one thing
Speaker 1: it has that the Apple Watch does not is sleep analysis,
Speaker 1: So the Apple Watch does not do anything with sleep
Speaker 1: right now, but the Galaxy Watch Active two does. Man,
Speaker 1: that's such a mouthful for that name. It also has
Speaker 1: LTE connectivity, a version of it with LTE, so you
Speaker 1: can get that, and apparently you're gonna be able to
Speaker 1: watch YouTube on here, so I can't wait to see
Speaker 1: how that works.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: I'm reading through the release here and it says you
Speaker 1: can watch a short video clip right from your wrist,
Speaker 1: so I'm not sure if it's full YouTube or just
Speaker 1: certain YouTube videos that are supported. This watch will start
Speaker 1: at two seventy nine two eighty for the forty millimeter
Speaker 1: and three hundred for the forty four milimeter beginning September
Speaker 1: twenty seventh. If you want the LTE version, it's a
Speaker 1: little bit more. I believe it was for something. I
Speaker 1: have a picture I got to look at, but don't
Speaker 1: quote me on that. But it's gonna be a little
Speaker 1: bit more expensive, all right. Next question comes from Scott
Speaker 1: Hey Rich, I'm looking at the cord with my cable
Speaker 1: service spectrum, but that leads me dependent on internet service,
Speaker 1: of which mine is very unreliable.
Speaker 2: Spectrum.
Speaker 1: Can you recommend any Internet services that are reliable and
Speaker 1: constant in the Huntington.
Speaker 2: Beach, California area?
Speaker 1: Scott so Scott most of the time, and I'm sure
Speaker 1: you figured this out by now. There are not many
Speaker 1: options for cable, or i should say, for internet.
Speaker 2: Where you'll live.
Speaker 1: Usually there are best case scenario two options. Sometimes you
Speaker 1: have a combination of something like the standard cable company
Speaker 1: along with the phone company, depending on how much they've
Speaker 1: wired your neighborhood.
Speaker 2: So you can have Spectrum.
Speaker 1: And you might have AT and T and you can
Speaker 1: compare those against each other. So there's a website that
Speaker 1: you can look at called high Speed Internet dot Com
Speaker 1: and they will you pop in your zip code and
Speaker 1: they will tell.
Speaker 2: You if.
Speaker 1: Let me see what Huntington Beach hun tang two. I'm
Speaker 1: seeing what your zip code is in Huntington Beach, and
Speaker 1: I'll pop it in here and we'll see if there's
Speaker 1: anything in your area with respect to these providers. So
Speaker 1: high Speed Internet dot Com has So you have Frontier
Speaker 1: and Spectrum, so that's pretty good. Those are two different
Speaker 1: choices that you do have, and one's fib or one's cable.
Speaker 1: So that's what you have and this will tell you
Speaker 1: the plans that they have and what's available in your
Speaker 1: area high speed Internet dot com. And so I would
Speaker 1: check that and see what you got, and I would
Speaker 1: go with the lesser of the two evils, because right
Speaker 1: now most of the time it's a lesser of two evils.
Speaker 1: I'm perfectly happy with my spectrum coverage. I think my
Speaker 1: spectrum is fine. I've got one hundred down. I don't
Speaker 1: like the price I pay like sixty five dollars a month.
Speaker 1: It used to be forty five, and it used to
Speaker 1: be like thirty back in the day. But now that
Speaker 1: the price for Internet is going up because all these
Speaker 1: internet providers know that you're cutting the cord, and so
Speaker 1: they raise the price on the internet to make up
Speaker 1: for the price that they're losing on the cable service.
Speaker 1: But again, high speed in com is the place to
Speaker 1: look to see what's available in your area and compare them.
Speaker 1: And I think that a lot of this is going
Speaker 1: to change when five G comes out in a big
Speaker 1: way because now the wireless companies like the AT and
Speaker 1: T's of the world and the Verizons will be able
Speaker 1: to deliver home high speed internet through wireless, which means
Speaker 1: they can blanket the entire nation in high speed internet,
Speaker 1: which is going to drive competition with the wired company.
Speaker 1: So suddenly you're going to see a premium for the
Speaker 1: wireless or you're going to see lower prices for the
Speaker 1: wireless perhaps. But then of course as time goes on
Speaker 1: and more people switch, things will level out. But when
Speaker 1: five G comes out, we will see some good competition,
Speaker 1: which will be good for all of our pocketbooks and
Speaker 1: wallets because the prices will drive down just a little
Speaker 1: bit before they level out later on. Speaking of cable,
Speaker 1: Disney has unveiled a bundle which includes it's Disney Plus,
Speaker 1: which is their upcoming Disney streaming service, along with Hulu
Speaker 1: and ESPN Plus. That is all going to be bundled
Speaker 1: for twelve ninety nine a month starting on November twelfth,
Speaker 1: thirteen dollars a month.
Speaker 2: For a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: You're talking Disney Plus, which is going to have all
Speaker 1: kinds of Disney content for your kids, family programming. Then
Speaker 1: you've got Hulu, which this is the kind of the standard,
Speaker 1: low end ad supported Hulu, so not the expensive plan
Speaker 1: has no commercials, or the Hulu with live TV. This
Speaker 1: is the cheaper version, or I should say, the cheapest
Speaker 1: version of Hulu. So it's not fantastic, but it's a start,
Speaker 1: and it's there, and it gives you a lot of
Speaker 1: the primetime TV shows. Then you also get ESPN Plus.
Speaker 1: I'm not a sports guy, so I don't really know
Speaker 1: what that's what they have on there, but I'm sure
Speaker 1: they have a lot of games and things like that
Speaker 1: on there, and a lot of documentaries and stuff. I
Speaker 1: don't think ESPN Plus will have all of the best games,
Speaker 1: like you're not gonna just survive if you love sports
Speaker 1: on ESPN Plus. But for thirteen dollars a month, this
Speaker 1: is very compelling, and my theory is that they are
Speaker 1: starting out very aggressively to compete with all the other
Speaker 1: offerings out there. So, for instance, you have Netflix, You've
Speaker 1: got Direct TV now, all these other things that people
Speaker 1: cobble together for their cable nowadays. But this is a
Speaker 1: This covers a lot of bases. You've got Disney for
Speaker 1: the family, You've got Hulu for mom and dad. When
Speaker 1: the kids go to sleep, they can watch the primetime shows.
Speaker 1: Then you've got ESPN Plus for the weekends when you
Speaker 1: want to watch some of the sporting events. So for
Speaker 1: thirteen dollars. That's not a bad deal. My thought is
Speaker 1: that that price will go up as time goes on,
Speaker 1: But for now, I see a lot of people kind
Speaker 1: of ditching Netflix if they can go to something like
Speaker 1: Disney Plus or this bundle, which gives them a lot
Speaker 1: of options for cheaper than when I'm paying for Netflix.
Speaker 1: I pay sixteen dollars for Netflix. This is thirteen for
Speaker 1: what's seen.
Speaker 2: To be more.
Speaker 1: Unless you're really into some of the Netflix original shows,
Speaker 1: then you're not gonna drop it. I know in my
Speaker 1: house it's a debate. I want to drop Netflix, my
Speaker 1: wife will not. Angel asks a question, do you what
Speaker 1: do you know about the app Clarity Money? Is it
Speaker 1: safe to sink financial info to it? The short of
Speaker 1: it is, it's only as safe as the encryption we
Speaker 1: have and as good as the password that you use,
Speaker 1: so you have to do your homework with these things.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of apps like Mint and Clarity
Speaker 1: Money that will connect to your bank account and slice
Speaker 1: and dice all of your information. I've used Clarity Money.
Speaker 1: I think that it's really nice. It is it's sort
Speaker 1: of aimed towards millennials, and it's really clean looking, so
Speaker 1: it looks really good.
Speaker 2: They do a nice job of If you.
Speaker 1: Type in Starbucks, it'll tell you exactly how much you've
Speaker 1: spent at Starbucks over the years. It organizes all kinds
Speaker 1: of stuff. It gives you a little hint system how
Speaker 1: you could save more money. I really like I don't
Speaker 1: use it very much. I kind of tested it out,
Speaker 1: but I found that I got bored with it. The
Speaker 1: thing that I'm really liking right now is called Personal Capital,
Speaker 1: and Personal Capital does a lot of these same things,
Speaker 1: but it you know, you put all your accounts in there,
Speaker 1: so you put your four O one k's, your investment accounts,
Speaker 1: checking account, your credit cards, any assets that you have.
Speaker 1: And this is much more powerful. This this kind of
Speaker 1: gives you a real snapshot of just how much you owe,
Speaker 1: how much you have, where your money is, how you're
Speaker 1: doing compared to the stock market. So it's it's geared
Speaker 1: a little bit more towards the investor. But it is
Speaker 1: a fantastic product. And that's called Personal Capital. And again,
Speaker 1: all these products, including Clarity Money, personal Capital, they all
Speaker 1: use the same kind of encryption. They all connect your
Speaker 1: bank account. A lot of them use a service called
Speaker 1: Stripe to connect your bank account so it's it's all
Speaker 1: very similar. So is it safe? I mean, is anything
Speaker 1: safe that's online. We are only as safe as the
Speaker 1: precautions we take and the things that we do. But
Speaker 1: is the app a scam? No, So if you trust
Speaker 1: the app, you can sink your information to it and
Speaker 1: go from there. But check out Personal Capital, Clarity Money, Mint.
Speaker 1: I don't recommend anymore because I feel like I just
Speaker 1: I don't see the value in Mint anymore. I feel
Speaker 1: like they've really switched from being interesting and helpful to
Speaker 1: just trying to sell me credit cards and stuff I
Speaker 1: don't need, and I just find that I just don't
Speaker 1: get the value out of Mint. In fact, I think
Speaker 1: I deleted my account with Mint, but I was one
Speaker 1: of the first to signed up. I remember I was
Speaker 1: working at cakew when I signed up, and I thought
Speaker 1: it was so cool to see everything on one page.
Speaker 1: And now there are so many services that offer this
Speaker 1: financial snapshot, including like your own bank. A lot of
Speaker 1: banks will let you do this right through their website.
Speaker 1: But check it out Clarity Money, Personal Capital, and there
Speaker 1: are others out there. If you have one, let me
Speaker 1: know if you like it. All right, So back to
Speaker 1: the Samsung event, one more thing, and that's it. I'll
Speaker 1: just talk about one more thing. If they announced this
Speaker 1: is the Galaxy Book S, and I actually kind of
Speaker 1: like this. This is a laptop that it's very powerful.
Speaker 1: Well it's not as powerful as your standard laptop, but
Speaker 1: it's got everything you need if you just need kind
Speaker 1: of a in between things. So maybe you don't want
Speaker 1: to buy a tablet, but you want your smartphone and
Speaker 1: maybe a nice laptop that you can type on.
Speaker 2: There's a trackpad, it's got a nice.
Speaker 1: Thirteen inch touchscreen, it runs Windows ten. But the neat
Speaker 1: thing about the Galaxy Book S is that there is
Speaker 1: LTE built in. I've always wanted LTE built into my laptop.
Speaker 1: It would just make so much sense when you travel
Speaker 1: to not have to deal with all these Wi Fi
Speaker 1: hotspots and you just are connected. And if you if
Speaker 1: you have a good Wi Fi hot spot in your
Speaker 1: hotel room, that's fine. But LTE is inherently more secure
Speaker 1: because you're not connecting to some sketchy network. And I'm
Speaker 1: not saying all Wi Fi networks are sketchy, but sometimes
Speaker 1: you're desperate and you just find one that works and
Speaker 1: you're willing to connect to it. So having that LTE
Speaker 1: connection is nice and it's funny because as I saw this,
Speaker 1: it just makes so much sense that all these cellular
Speaker 1: companies love the trend of LTE in everything. You've got
Speaker 1: LTE in your phone, You've got LTE in your car,
Speaker 1: You've got LTE on your watch, You've got LTE on
Speaker 1: your laptop. Now you've got lt on your tablet. Theoretically,
Speaker 1: you could be walking around with your phone, your watch,
Speaker 1: and your laptop all connected to LTE. That's three devices
Speaker 1: that you're paying for now for an LTE connection versus
Speaker 1: the old days when it was just one and you
Speaker 1: could have more. You could have your car, you could
Speaker 1: have your tablet. It gets a little crazy. You could
Speaker 1: have your kid's phone. So it really is a little
Speaker 1: nutty at this point. But you do have a thirteen
Speaker 1: point three inch display, Like I said, that is a
Speaker 1: touch screen. They say you get twenty three hours of
Speaker 1: continuous video playback with one charge.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: When I was looking at them in the demo area,
Speaker 1: it was saying between seven and nine hours.
Speaker 2: When I was actually.
Speaker 1: Using it to do stuff, So I would take the
Speaker 1: twenty three hours to the grain of salt. It's up
Speaker 1: to a terabyte of expandable storage. And the way that
Speaker 1: you charge it is through the same connector MICROUS or
Speaker 1: USB C that you would use on your phone, So
Speaker 1: that's kind of nice. If you're traveling with this thing,
Speaker 1: you can just literally use the same USB C connector
Speaker 1: that you used to charge your phone to charge the laptop.
Speaker 2: And it's really nice.
Speaker 1: It comes in two colors, gold and gray, and it's
Speaker 1: a beautiful laptop. It's very slim, very sleek, very lightweight.
Speaker 1: It's got eight gigs a RAM. Let's see, okay, two
Speaker 1: fifty six looks like the bottom of the storage five
Speaker 1: twelve built in and then microSD slot up to a terabyte,
Speaker 1: and of course that's going to be, you know, something
Speaker 1: that you'd have to expand later. But it's got everything
Speaker 1: you need. It's got a fingerprint sensor, it's got Star speakers,
Speaker 1: and it has a selfie camera as well. So this
Speaker 1: is nice. I mean for nine to ninety nine starting price.
Speaker 1: It's kind of aimed towards the person that just wants
Speaker 1: something that works, like a laptop has Windows, does everything
Speaker 1: they need, but doesn't have to be the most powerful
Speaker 1: laptop out there. This is running a qualcom mobile chip inside,
Speaker 1: so it's not not the standard chips that you might
Speaker 1: find like in an Apple laptop or a Windows laptop.
Speaker 1: All right, let's get to another question from Debbie. She says,
Speaker 1: I have an iPhone six S and I'll be traveling
Speaker 1: to Europe and don't want to carry along a camera.
Speaker 1: Can you tell me the best app that is going
Speaker 1: to provide a better picture quality. I don't think that
Speaker 1: any camera app is going to provide better picture quality
Speaker 1: than the built in app on the iPhone. There are
Speaker 1: apps that take advantage of what they call the iPhone
Speaker 1: camera APIs, so they can be built specifically to take
Speaker 1: advantage of the photography built into the iPhone. The app
Speaker 1: that I would recommend if I had to is called
Speaker 1: Halied Hlid, and the only reason I recommend it is
Speaker 1: because it gives you more control over your pictures. You
Speaker 1: can do a lot with this camera. There's a million
Speaker 1: cameras for the iPhone out there. I wouldn't recommend any
Speaker 1: of them, but the Halied one is pretty decent. It
Speaker 1: was invented by a couple of guys that know a
Speaker 1: thing or two about cameras because they were movie makers,
Speaker 1: or they still are. I'm not sure, but there's a
Speaker 1: lot of different features built into this camera that works.
Speaker 2: So it also shoots in.
Speaker 1: Raw and it just you know it. Let's see what
Speaker 1: do you have here? Smart auto, so you've got an
Speaker 1: auto feature, You've got focus parking or focus peaking. Rather,
Speaker 1: you've got a histogram, grid and level raw plus JPEG.
Speaker 1: I don't think you're going to need any of these.
Speaker 1: I think you just take your phone. I mean, I've
Speaker 1: been around the world and I've never taken a phone
Speaker 1: out side of my camera. I mean, I've taken some
Speaker 1: like go pros and stuff like that, but I've been
Speaker 1: everywhere and I just think that the phone you have
Speaker 1: in your pocket is going to be the best one.
Speaker 1: I know people that want to bring DSLRs and SLRs,
Speaker 1: but if you're a true photographer, you're gonna have one
Speaker 1: of those. But if you're telling me you have an
Speaker 1: iPhone success you're going to Europe, you don't want to
Speaker 1: carry a camera, Just carry your iPhone.
Speaker 2: You're gonna be just fine.
Speaker 1: Now, when it comes to editing pictures, you can do
Speaker 1: a lot after you take them, And the app I
Speaker 1: recommend for that is called snapseed.
Speaker 2: It's owned by Google. It is so smart, it is
Speaker 2: so cool.
Speaker 1: You will be amazed what you can do in post
Speaker 1: processing with that app, with the pictures that you already
Speaker 1: take right on the iPhone. So those are the two
Speaker 1: things I recommend. Good luck and have a great trip.
Speaker 1: I'm jealous. Where are you going in Europe?
Speaker 2: I want to know. I want to go to Europe.
Speaker 2: Let's see what else do we have to talk about.
Speaker 1: Amazon introducing a new prime benefit for students, Amazon Music
Speaker 1: Unlimited for justinety nine cents a month. This is a
Speaker 1: direct war against Spotify, which has a student plan for
Speaker 1: five dollars a month.
Speaker 2: But here's the catch.
Speaker 1: You have to have a Prime student membership, which I
Speaker 1: think is fifty percent off the normal prime so I
Speaker 1: think it's about six dollars a month. But here's the thing.
Speaker 1: When I was a college student, I was broke. I
Speaker 1: didn't have money for a subscription to anything. And I
Speaker 1: guess maybe a lot of students have a subscription to Amazon,
Speaker 1: but I mean, really, I don't know if you need
Speaker 1: a subscription to Amazon when you're a college student. I mean,
Speaker 1: how much stuff can can you buy through there? I
Speaker 1: wasn't doing a lot of online shopping. I wasn't doing
Speaker 1: a lot of shopping at all, and I feel like
Speaker 1: a lot of these students probably just latch onto mom
Speaker 1: and Dad's Amazon Prime account. I know it used to
Speaker 1: be easy to share your Prime account with other people,
Speaker 1: especially those outside your household. Maybe Amazon has clamped down
Speaker 1: on that just a little bit and made it tougher
Speaker 1: and also made it more interesting that you can get
Speaker 1: this Prime Student benefit. So the Prime Student membership plan
Speaker 1: is I think it's free for six months. So you
Speaker 1: can get a six month trial of Amazon Duck at
Speaker 1: Amazon dot com slash Prime Student, and then you can
Speaker 1: get the or hold on this. I'm trying to figure out,
Speaker 1: is it. Yeah, college students can sign up for a
Speaker 1: six month trial of Prime Student and enjoy fast free
Speaker 1: delivery from Prime Plus movies, TV shows, and then the
Speaker 1: music for a dollar extra per month, and this gives
Speaker 1: you access to fifty million songs and the latest releases,
Speaker 1: so sort of like Spotify. I don't know, I mean,
Speaker 1: if you're paying for Spotify, I don't see a lot
Speaker 1: of college students switching, but maybe if they are on
Speaker 1: that Spotify subscription for five dollars a month, they would
Speaker 1: rather have the ninety nine cents a month, and it's
Speaker 1: definitely a savings but I feel like there's also a
Speaker 1: cachet that comes along with having Spotify. It's sort of
Speaker 1: the gold standard of music services, and I think a
Speaker 1: lot of students, I don't know, maybe maybe they don't care.
Speaker 1: But personally, I'm using Apple Music because it's free with
Speaker 1: my Verizon account. So I switched from from the Spotify
Speaker 1: plan when that came out to be free, and I
Speaker 1: haven't really looked back because you know, to me, they're
Speaker 1: all the same as long as you've got the playlist
Speaker 1: that you like, I don't really see a difference. And
Speaker 1: to me that the playlists on Apple Music are just fine.
Speaker 1: They're not as far reaching as the ones that you
Speaker 1: can get on Spotify. Spotify has a playlist for everything,
Speaker 1: whereas Apple Music is a little simpler.
Speaker 2: But it doesn't bother me. I'm just fine.
Speaker 1: I've got my country playlist, I've got my pop playlist,
Speaker 1: I've got my workout playlist, and I'm just trying to
Speaker 1: back get back into the indie playlist as well. That's
Speaker 1: not working too well. I'm kind of forgetting all the
Speaker 1: bands I used to like. My wife got me into
Speaker 1: country music, and so I've been listening to a lot
Speaker 1: of country, and on Spotify they had a pop and
Speaker 1: country mix that I really liked. And then when I
Speaker 1: switched to the Apple Music there is no mix of
Speaker 1: those two genres, but to me, a lot of the country,
Speaker 1: the new country, I should say, is very poppy. So
Speaker 1: but I used to only listen to indie music and
Speaker 1: you know, like Lumineers and all that stuff and Cage
Speaker 1: the Elephant, But now I don't really listen to that
Speaker 1: anymore because I got into the country stuff. So do
Speaker 1: you care? Do you care what I listened to? I
Speaker 1: don't know, but I'll tell you what I don't listen to,
Speaker 1: and that's hard rock, heavy metal, or I should say
Speaker 1: heavy metal. I don't really listen to that stuff. But
Speaker 1: the rest of it, I'm pretty open to a lot
Speaker 1: of music. I like the coffee house on the weekends.
Speaker 1: I like, you know, some classical. If I'm trying to work,
Speaker 1: I like study beats. I like some of the chill music.
Speaker 1: I'm kind of a fan of all music except for
Speaker 1: the head banging stuff. Question from Darlene. Darlene says, I
Speaker 1: I like to check things. I like to check off
Speaker 1: things on a list. Currently, I use a notes app
Speaker 1: to make my list, but there's no way to check them.
Speaker 2: Off as I do it.
Speaker 1: Does one exist that you can recommend? There are many
Speaker 1: apps that will let you do this, but a very
Speaker 1: simple one that's free and not a lot of fuss.
Speaker 2: Is called Google Keep.
Speaker 1: This is Google's note taking app. It works on both
Speaker 1: iPhone and Android, and you can make a list like
Speaker 1: my wife and I do. We make a list for
Speaker 1: the grocery store, and you can check it off, and
Speaker 1: you can. I believe there's an option to keep things
Speaker 1: there when you check it off, and I believe there's
Speaker 1: an option to also let it disappear, so I think
Speaker 1: you can see it however you want. So if you
Speaker 1: want to keep everything xed out, you can do that,
Speaker 1: or if you're shopping, I find that it's really easy
Speaker 1: to let them disappear. So you make your list and
Speaker 1: then as you buy the things on your list, you
Speaker 1: just check them off and they disappear. So instead of
Speaker 1: having to keep going through your list one hundred times
Speaker 1: your head mentally remembering what you've gotten, already, everything's gone
Speaker 1: that you've gotten, and I believe there's a way to
Speaker 1: take it back. But why would you need to? So
Speaker 1: I would just check out Google Keep. It's a great app,
Speaker 1: it's free. There are a lot of other apps that
Speaker 1: can do this, but most of them are a freemium app,
Speaker 1: which means it's going to be free for the basic use,
Speaker 1: but they're going to be nagging you to switch to
Speaker 1: a paid version of that app at every step of
Speaker 1: the way. So anything you want to do with this app,
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, they're gonna be like, well, can
Speaker 1: you pay three dollars a month? Can you pay six
Speaker 1: bucks for the year? Can you pay ten dollars for
Speaker 1: the year? Whereas Google Keep is totally free and they
Speaker 1: don't try to upsell you on anything. Verizon Verizon, Verizon, Man,
Speaker 1: I don't even know where to start with this. Verizon
Speaker 1: has new plans. It's so funny because unlimited does not
Speaker 1: mean unlimited in today's world, and they have four new
Speaker 1: unlimited plans through Verizon. How do you have four unlimited plants?
Speaker 1: Unlimited should be unlimited, but no, it's unlimited with the
Speaker 1: craziest names that make no sense. Let me go through
Speaker 1: these names. Start Unlimited, play more unlimited, do more unlimited,
Speaker 1: Get more unlimited, The start unlimited starts at thirty five
Speaker 1: dollars a month. Hold on, let's go down to just
Speaker 1: to Oh my gosh, let's just go to the single
Speaker 1: plan because the other thing that these plans do is
Speaker 1: they say one hundred and sixty dollars for four lines,
Speaker 1: but not everyone needs four lines. I just need two.
Speaker 1: But let's just go with one line. Start Unlimited is
Speaker 1: seventy dollars a month. Play More Unlimited is eighty dollars
Speaker 1: a month. Then it gets really confusing because Do More
Speaker 1: Unlimited is also eighty dollars a month, and then Get
Speaker 1: More Unlimited is ninety a month.
Speaker 2: What do you get with these various plans?
Speaker 1: The Start Unlimited is seventy dollars a month for unlimited
Speaker 1: four GLTE data and DVD quality streaming, which is for
Speaker 1: eighty p So I don't like that, and you get
Speaker 1: Apple Music free for six months. Then play More Unlimited
Speaker 1: gives you five G access for ten dollars a month,
Speaker 1: which is free for a limited time. Unlimited four g
Speaker 1: lt E plus twenty five gigs of premium data. What
Speaker 1: does that mean if it's unlimited? What does that mean exactly?
Speaker 1: So maybe it's unlimited up until twenty five gigs and
Speaker 1: then it might slow down after that. Then you have
Speaker 1: unlimited hot Spot, which is actually not unlimited because it's
Speaker 1: only up to fifteen gigs of four g LTE. So yes,
Speaker 1: it's unlimited, but not at high speeds. This is so crazy.
Speaker 1: Then you get seven to twenty HD streaming and Apple
Speaker 1: Music is included. Then you jump up and do more
Speaker 1: Unlimited its eighty dollars a month. That gives you five
Speaker 1: g axs for ten dollars a month extra unlimited four
Speaker 1: g lt E plus fifty gigs of premium data. So again,
Speaker 1: I think you get fifty gigs before it might throttle
Speaker 1: and slow down. Unlimited Mobile hot Spot up to fifteen
Speaker 1: gigs of four GLTE. Now you're going back down to
Speaker 1: DVD quality streaming, and then you have free music for
Speaker 1: six months. I just don't understand why this plan would
Speaker 1: be more. And then you get five hundred gigs of
Speaker 1: Verizon Cloud storage. Now that's actually interesting because I've not
Speaker 1: used the Verizon storage, but that's not a bad amount
Speaker 1: of Verizon storage. If you're trying to put all your
Speaker 1: pictures or something in the Verizon cloud, I wouldn't recommend that,
Speaker 1: but I'm sure some people do that, then you have
Speaker 1: the top of the top, get more unlimited. This is
Speaker 1: ninety dollars a month. Five g access is ten dollars
Speaker 1: extra a month free for a limited time, unlimited four
Speaker 1: g LTE, but you get seventy five gigs of premium data.
Speaker 1: So again I think this will give you seventy five
Speaker 1: gigs a full throttle, and then after that they might
Speaker 1: slow you down. Then you get unlimited mobile hotspot up
Speaker 1: to thirty gigs at four GLTE and you get back
Speaker 1: up to seven twenty HD streaming and Apple Music is
Speaker 1: included again, plus the five hundred gigs of Verizon Cloud storage.
Speaker 2: And I believe that all of these.
Speaker 1: Plans include a ten dollars a month discount if you
Speaker 1: sign up for paper free billing and auto pay, So
Speaker 1: if you didn't, you're actually looking at prices from eighty
Speaker 1: dollars a month to one hundred dollars a month if
Speaker 1: you don't, if you want to see your bill before
Speaker 1: they charge you. And this is my favorite thing. Every
Speaker 1: month I get my little thank you from Verizon, thank
Speaker 1: you for submitting your payment, and there's no thank you.
Speaker 1: You took my checking card number because I have to
Speaker 1: give my debit card number, and you just took the
Speaker 1: payment out of my debit card. I didn't have any
Speaker 1: option because am I really going to give up ten
Speaker 1: dollars a month over a year. That's one hundred and
Speaker 1: twenty dollars a year to pay just to see my
Speaker 1: bill before you take it, or for me to pay
Speaker 1: my bill at my leisure. No, that would seem silly.
Speaker 1: So you're not thanking me for anything. You kind of
Speaker 1: forced me into it. Then there's one other plan called
Speaker 1: the Just Kids, which is fifty dollars a month, which
Speaker 1: seems insane for a kid's plan. You would think a
Speaker 1: kid's plan would be twenty dollars a month. By the way,
Speaker 1: the Kid's plan is terrible. It includes five gigs of
Speaker 1: four GLTE data, DVD quality streaming, unlimited talk and text
Speaker 1: to twenty contacts, and parental controls. That to me sounds
Speaker 1: like a twenty dollars a month plan. I don't know
Speaker 1: how they're getting fifty dollars a month for just five
Speaker 1: measly gigs of data and calls to only twenty people
Speaker 1: and DVD quality streaming. That is a terrible deal. This
Speaker 1: makes me want to switch from Verizon immediately. But I
Speaker 1: don't know where i'd go. I guess visible maybe, But
Speaker 1: I kind of use I use my Plan a lot,
Speaker 1: so I shouldn't be talking so much garbage about them,
Speaker 1: because I actually do use a significant amount of my
Speaker 1: Plan when I'm using it a lot. I've used up
Speaker 1: to like seventy five gigs a month. So anyway, that's
Speaker 1: the new Verizon plans, which are overly complicated. I don't
Speaker 1: know what's going on, but I will tell you this,
Speaker 1: the four G LTE plans will take a nose dive
Speaker 1: once five G comes out and everyone's promoting that four
Speaker 1: G networks will be a dime a dozen. And I
Speaker 1: hope prices will go down a little bit in the
Speaker 1: future because everyone's going to be so fixated on five
Speaker 1: G and charging us more for those plans. You're already
Speaker 1: seeing that these are going up ten dollars a month
Speaker 1: additional for five G, so hopefully the four G plans
Speaker 1: will get just a little bit cheaper. Amazon is starting
Speaker 1: autonomous robot deliveries in Irvine, California. I reported about this
Speaker 1: on KTLA and on my social media a while back.
Speaker 1: This Amazon Scout device, which looks like a little robot
Speaker 1: kind of like a little Amazon Prime box on wheels.
Speaker 1: It rolls around the neighborhood and it delivers packages to houses.
Speaker 1: So originally they were doing this up in the Seattle area,
Speaker 1: and I believe it was a city north of Seattle.
Speaker 1: Now they're doing Irvine, California. So I have to get
Speaker 1: out to Irvine to test this out because I want
Speaker 1: to see how this thing delivers. I'm so curious to
Speaker 1: see it in action. The video that they show you
Speaker 1: online was recorded at Wisteria Lane at Universal Studios on
Speaker 1: a backlot, which is highly controlled and clearly not real life.
Speaker 1: So in real life in Irvine, it's going to let's see,
Speaker 1: what do they say. It's going to occur Monday through
Speaker 1: Friday during daylight hours, and there's going to be an
Speaker 1: Amazon Scout ambassador to make sure that deliveries go okay,
Speaker 1: at least initially. But I can't wait to see this
Speaker 1: thing in action because it just sounds so cool and
Speaker 1: so futuristic to have a little autonomous robot dropping off
Speaker 1: a package at your front door. I saw this thing
Speaker 1: at CS called the Animal, which is very similar to this,
Speaker 1: except it looks more like a dog with a what
Speaker 1: would you say, a basket on its back and it
Speaker 1: takes the package out of the truck. The idea is
Speaker 1: that the delivery truck pulls up at the end of
Speaker 1: your street, package is loaded onto this little robot. Robot
Speaker 1: walks down your street, goes up to your front door.
Speaker 1: In this case, it can walk up the steps with
Speaker 1: this animal, and then it rings the doorbell with one
Speaker 1: of its arms and it falls over to the side
Speaker 1: to drop your package. So it sort of leans over
Speaker 1: and drops your package on the ground and then walks away.
Speaker 1: That's the demo I saw. It was really cool. It's
Speaker 1: on my Instagram if you want to see it. This
Speaker 1: is a little bit different because I haven't really seen
Speaker 1: how this drops off the package if it rings your
Speaker 1: doorbell and then pops open. But at this point the
Speaker 1: Amazon delivery drivers are just leaving all the packages on
Speaker 1: the front step. Anyway, I would say for ninety nine
Speaker 1: percent of them, unless it's a super high value item.
Speaker 1: I think they've ring your doorbell and then wait for
Speaker 1: a signature. But remember the day when you had to
Speaker 1: sign for everything. Now, I think the way Amazon does
Speaker 1: it is they have a value li so if something
Speaker 1: is under a certain value, they don't care they're gonna
Speaker 1: eat it if they're going to eat the cost if
Speaker 1: it gets stolen, or if someone claims it was stolen,
Speaker 1: because they may say that they leave it on your doorstep,
Speaker 1: and you may say, oh, I didn't get it, and
Speaker 1: I know that the delivery drivers are also taking pictures,
Speaker 1: but that still doesn't really hold up. If you say
Speaker 1: didn't get it, you didn't get it, if you didn't
Speaker 1: sign for it. There's no proof even if you're lying.
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying you should do that, but I
Speaker 1: think that Amazon just used an algorithm to kind of
Speaker 1: figure out whether this thing is high value and whether
Speaker 1: they can leave it there or if they really need
Speaker 1: to get a signature. And I'm not even sure they
Speaker 1: get signatures for it. I can't remember the last time
Speaker 1: they required a signature on anything that they've delivered.
Speaker 2: To my house.
Speaker 1: All right, final email from Shannon. I want to tell
Speaker 1: you how much I love, love, love your podcast and
Speaker 1: when you are on TV in Chicago. Thanks for all
Speaker 1: you have helped me with just by listening to you.
Speaker 2: Well, Thank you, Shannon.
Speaker 1: That is a great way to end the show. And
Speaker 1: yes I'm on TV in Chicago. W A lot of
Speaker 1: the stations that are Tribune Company, which is the company
Speaker 1: I work for. KTLA is owned by them, soon to
Speaker 1: be a company called Nextstar, which I used to work for.
Speaker 1: By the way, they run our stuff that we do,
Speaker 1: so often you'll see me clarify where something is in California.
Speaker 1: I'll say something like Irvine, California, because people in other
Speaker 1: areas need to know that it's not just a local
Speaker 1: news kind of thing. So yes, WGN runs. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much for watching out there. WGN, I would say,
Speaker 1: is probably number two after KTLA for the most viewers
Speaker 1: of my tech segment, But we're on in different places
Speaker 1: like San Diego and Indianapolis and all kinds of places,
Speaker 1: and who knows what's gonna happen when nextar see where
Speaker 1: it goes. Thanks so much for listening to the show.
Speaker 1: I'd love it if you subscribed. If you're just listening
Speaker 1: to this on a website or someone sent it to you,
Speaker 1: just go into your podcast app and search rich on
Speaker 1: Tech and hit that subscribe button. That could be Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: pocket casts, or overcast.
Speaker 2: Those are a few good ones.
Speaker 1: If you want to see past episodes, you can go
Speaker 1: to KTLA dot com, slash rich On tech and I'd
Speaker 1: love if you would leave a review for the show.
Speaker 1: That way more people discover it on whatever platform you
Speaker 1: are listening on. If you have a question you would
Speaker 1: like answered, just go to Rich on tech dot tv
Speaker 1: and hit contact and you can sign up for my
Speaker 1: newsletter that is at richontech dot tv. Thanks so much
Speaker 1: for listening. I'm Rich tomiro On behalf of myself producer
Speaker 1: Megan who's on vacation. She'll be back next week. I
Speaker 1: hope that you have a great day. I will talk
Speaker 1: to you real soon.