Tristan Rayner / Android Authority
👋 Good morning and welcome to another roundup of what’s happening in technology. Before we get into today’s technical news, we would like to thank OPPO for sponsoring this newsletter!
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Dyson’s facial vacuum
This week it’s April 1, but this is no joke! Dyson, the very serious multinational technology company famous for luxury vacuum cleaners and the like, has a new set of headphones that also includes a built-in air purifier that looks as odd as you can imagine.
Look, here’s James Dyson wearing the new Dyson Zone in what I think is London (despite Dyson being a Singaporean company):
Tristan Rayner / Android Authority
A bit Bane-esque, huh? There’s endless fun to be had with this, including my favorite joke yet:No one cared who I was until I turned on the vacuum cleaner”, by Stephen Warwick. But Dyson is just as serious about this as usual with its products. Apparently it took six years to make it, with 500 prototypes (yes, it was in the works pre-pandemic).
What it does:
The idea is to reduce air pollution and noise pollution, presumably in cities where air quality and noise are everywhere. Enjoy some press releases from Dyson: “Precision-engineered compressors in the earcups draw air through the dual-layer filters […] the negatively charged electrostatic filter medium captures ultra-fine particles such as allergens and particles from sources such as brake dust, industrial combustion and construction, while a potassium-enriched carbon layer captures pollutants from town gas such as NO2 and SO2. The compressor directs the purified air to the wearer’s nose and mouth through the non-contact visor, formed with flexible returns that direct the stream of purified air to the wearer’s nose and mouth.” In other words: they filter the air, without necessarily having to be a mask. Dyson calls the mouthpiece its visor, and it snaps on or off with magnets, but there’s also a full-contact mask option that some folks saw, with full FFP2/N95 protection. This is also Dyson’s first audio product. It comes with an “advanced noise reduction system”, with three different modes.
Technical details:
The Guardian had these details: “The battery lasts up to 4.5 hours at the Zone’s lowest purge rate or up to 90 minutes, intended to be used for short periods only. They last up to 40 hours when used only as headphones, fast charging via USB-C to 60% in 20 minutes and can be recharged when needed. “The Dyson Zone will go on sale in the fall at an undisclosed premium price that is expected to be between £500 and £1,000.” That pricing is something like $500-$1,000, which is again the classic Dyson. Looking at a list of world cities and their air quality rankings, this could be one for people in Hanoi, Jakarta, Kathmandu and Delhi. However, that kind of pricing seems to be more for western visitors to those cities… The obvious comparison? The Razer Zephyr…which costs $99, without the audio.
To round up
📱 Redmi Note 11 Pro Plus launched worldwide: 120W charging for less than $400 (Android Authority).
🎮 Sony announces all-new PlayStation Plus: The reports were accurate and a real rival to Game Pass here is from Sony (Android Authority). That said, it falls short: New first-party games don’t launch on the service at the same time they hit retail, unlike Xbox.
👉 PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan explained why in this interview, suggesting that it really just wants people to pay after they’ve invested a lot of money, and/or are a little afraid of taking the risk opening games for a huge amount of money. public who do not pay directly. In short: because money. Sony has always been a bit stingy… (gamesindustry.biz).
#️⃣ Google Docs gets more Markdown support (The Verge).
🤔 “Why are banks only open when people are at work/school?” (r/stupid questions).
weirdness Wednesday
I once tried to program a robot I built to balance on two wheels, and it was a stressful experience writing control loop algorithms. The theory wasn’t bad, but the practical code was great.
Tristan Rayner / Android Authority
MIT researchers had 4,000 versions of the robot learn to walk in simulation and then run in multiple directions, throwing various surfaces inside, such as grass, pavement and gravel. Apparently, three hours of practice time in the simulation world was equivalent to 100 hours in the real world. “The thousands of simulated robots could try all kinds of different ways to move their limbs. Techniques that led to speed were rewarded, while bad ones were discarded. Over time, the virtual robots learned by trial and error, just like a human does.” “The result isn’t particularly elegant, but it’s stable and fast, and the robot did it mostly on its own.” I’ve seen AI bots do this in run and jump simulations, but this one takes it a little further and it’s nice to see the videos of it scurrying around.
Cheers,
Tristan Rayner, Editor-in-Chief
Comments
This post Daily Authority: 😷 Dyson Gets Weird
was original published at “https://www.androidauthority.com/da-march-30-2022-3146861/”
