News and Updates from Gadget Hacks: Page 3

Microsoft's Microsoft 365 Copilot app now goes by a different name: Microsoft Copilot. That's not just cosmetic. As part of the same round of Microsoft 365 Copilot app updates, Microsoft is merging existing Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot installations into one client on Windows and Mac devices.

Motorola is scheduled to unveil the Signature 27 on September 22, timed to Qualcomm's Snapdragon Summit in Hawaii, according to Tech Advisor. The phone follows Motorola's slimline Signature flagship.

The iPhone 18 Pro Max and Galaxy S26 Ultra have now been through the same controlled drop test, giving buyers a much cleaner comparison than the separate durability tests available immediately after Apple's phone launched.

Anyone searching for whether Pixel 11 voice typing is coming to Google Play Books needs to separate two different claims. Google has now confirmed a Pixel 11-specific Gboard feature called Rambler, but it has not announced a Google Play Books-specific voice typing update.

What people want in a new phone depends almost entirely on why they're shopping for one. Someone whose screen just cracked wants whatever's in stock that works today. Someone whose two-year-old flagship still runs fine wants to know whether a new camera or a smarter assistant is worth paying for.

This Pixel 10 Pro vs Pixel 11 Pro comparison sticks to the Pro model, not the standard Pixel 11, because the Pro is the 10 Pro's direct successor and the phone most likely to tempt someone weighing a new flagship against a discounted last-gen one.

Motorola posted a short teaser video from its official X account this week, timed to land alongside Apple's iPhone Duo launch. The clip ends with a brief silhouette of an unnamed foldable phone that looks shorter and wider than Motorola's current Razr Fold, according to GSMArena and ChannelNews. The phone appears on screen for about five seconds, near the end of the clip, per Android Police. The Motorola wide Razr Fold teaser confirms one thing: the company is building a new form factor. The...

Drivers searching for "Google Maps Android Auto speedometer disappearing" are running into a confusing pattern: the feature isn't gone, it's arriving unevenly. Google Maps has started showing a live speedometer on some Android Auto dashboards, but the rollout is server-side, unannounced, and inconsistent enough that two drivers on the same app version can get different results. The available reporting points to an uneven rollout, not a confirmed removal.

Google Meet's web homepage now displays conference room and physical meeting location details directly on upcoming meeting cards, so in-office workers can see where they're headed without opening a Calendar invite first. Google confirmed the change, saying it lets in-office users see where they need to go directly from the Meet landing page.

Ask "what is Microsoft Copilot" and you'll still get several different correct answers, because Microsoft uses the Copilot name across a unified chat app, AI features inside Word and Excel, a class of Windows PCs, work-account licenses, and tools for building custom agents.

Apple is reportedly building a new smart home hub: a HomePod-style speaker paired with a roughly 7-inch display, running a new operating system built on tvOS, alongside refreshed Apple TV and HomePod hardware.

Apple's first foldable iPhone now has a price and a calendar. The iPhone Duo starts at $1,999 for 256GB, opens for preorder on October 16, and ships October 23 (MacRumors). Before that money changes hands, the real question for iPhone owners is whether the redesigned iOS 27 layout Apple built specifically for a folding display makes up for the hardware compromises that come with any first-generation foldable. The iPhone Duo software features shown off this week look more thought-out than the...

iOS 27 lands as a free software update on Monday, September 14, Apple confirmed yesterday, and the biggest of the new iOS 27 features by far is Siri AI: a rebuilt assistant Apple says can read what's on your screen, dig through your messages and photos, and pull live answers from the web.

Samsung set August 7, 2026, as the general availability date for the Galaxy Z Fold8 and Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra, but some customers have seen estimated arrival dates extend well beyond launch day.

Searches for iOS 27 MagSafe Wallet designs are mixing together two different kinds of Wallet news.

Google Photos is building a tool that could finally automate the tedious part of making beat-synced Highlight Videos.

A red badge has planted itself on the Settings app for some iPhone owners, tied to a prompt that reads "Activate iCloud Storage," and it won't clear no matter how many times it gets tapped. The odd part: the alert is showing up on devices where iCloud+ or Apple One storage is already active.

Hideo Kojima's Physint has moved to Xbox after Sony ended its involvement in the project, according to statements reported today by VGC and Variety. Xbox will now work with Kojima Productions on the game, replacing PlayStation Studios as its publishing partner.

Google has spent the past several months steadily expanding what the Gemini overlay can do, and the latest round of Gemini overlay new features makes the strategic intent hard to miss. The overlay the assistant panel you pull up from any Android screen is gaining video generation, music creation, Canvas, and Guided Learning directly on its surface. Taken together with a persistent floating bubble still in testing and a Gemini Live redesign that eliminates its own dedicated screen, the changes...

The Apple Intelligence subscription cost for Home app camera features now has a specific number attached to it: $9.99 a month, tied to Apple's 2TB iCloud+ plan. That figure comes from beta release notes for macOS 27, the update Apple calls Golden Gate internally, which confirm that AI-powered camera tools require the top iCloud+ tier even though the features themselves run on iPhone and iPad (MacRumors; MacRumors).

The sources reviewed here trace the phone's reported specifications to one Gagadget article, and the phone hasn't launched yet. Gagadget reported this week that the Magic 9 Pro Max pairs dual 200MP cameras developed with ARRI, a mechanical gimbal, and support for ARRI's LogC3 color format, with a China launch planned for September 28 starting at 6,999 yuan, roughly £855/$875.

New European pricing figures suggest the S26 FE could cost meaningfully more than its predecessor, while confirmed upgrades still fall short of justifying the gap

A viral claim swept through social media this year: starting in February 2027, EU law will force Apple, Samsung, and every other smartphone maker to bring back pop-off battery covers. It's not true, but the real story is more interesting than the myth (Annie Lab, 2 months ago).

Sony may be preparing a camera upgrade for the Xperia 1 IX that swaps out the flagship's main sensor for a larger one, which would be the first change to that specific component since the Xperia 1 V launched in 2023. The claim traces to Japanese blog Sumahu Digest and was reported today by PhoneArena.

The Samsung Galaxy SmartTag 3 leak that surfaced on September 11 centers on one detail that changes how the tracker works in daily use: the built-in loop for a keyring, carabiner, or lanyard appears to be gone.

Google's September Pixel Drop scam detection features are live now, alongside a redesigned Pixel VIPs contact widget for calling and texting the people you talk to most. Both started rolling out on September 15, 2026, as part of the September Pixel Drop.

Rivian's chief software officer has a blunt answer for anyone still shopping for Apple CarPlay in an electric truck: the debate itself, he argues, no longer matters. That's a striking claim from a company whose own buyers once ranked CarPlay as their single most-requested feature, according to The Verge, two months ago.

Motorola has become the first phone maker to announce a device built around Qualcomm's new flagship chip, the Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6. The company unveiled the Motorola Signature 27 at Qualcomm's Snapdragon Summit in Hawaii this week, according to The Verge and Tech Advisor. XDA Developers describes it as Motorola's "ultra-premium" entry, positioned as one of the first phones anywhere to run this chip.

Apple is reportedly building an entirely new operating system, possibly called homeOS, to run a long-rumored smart home hub. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman describes it as blending tvOS, watchOS, and iOS elements, and it would join iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, tvOS, and visionOS as a distinct Apple smart home operating system if it ships (MacRumors, today).

Apple released macOS 27 Golden Gate on Sept. 14, 2026, as a free update for eligible Macs, calling it a stability, performance, and compatibility release recommended for all macOS 27 users. The headline macOS 27 Golden Gate features center on Siri: Siri AI now lives inside Spotlight for conversational search, while a separate Siri AI app handles saved conversations synced through iCloud.

Mention MapQuest in conversation and Google Maps tends to come up as some kind of corporate cousin. It isn't. The short answer to who owns MapQuest is System1, a digital advertising and customer-acquisition company, not Google. System1 confirms that it owns and operates MapQuest, after acquiring the service from Verizon in 2019. The purchase price was not disclosed publicly.

Xiaomi spent this week showing off the camera system inside its upcoming 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, according to a report published today by Android Authority. The timing is pointed. Samsung hasn't officially revealed the Galaxy S27 Ultra camera upgrade yet, and leakers are still fighting over what its telephoto lens will even look like. Line up the two roadmaps and a pattern shows up fast: Xiaomi appears to be engineering specifically for the mid-zoom range that Samsung's 3x camera has struggled...

A data plan can disappear in a single evening of streaming.

Apple spent part of the iPhone Duo unveiling drawing a sharp contrast with rival foldables, including the awkward black space that can surround apps not designed for larger folding screens. But Apple's first foldable won't make that problem disappear overnight. As 9to5Google noted after the Sept. 9 unveiling, older iPhone apps can face a similar limitation when opened on Duo's 7.6-inch inner display.

Ireland's Data Protection Commission fined Google €403 million ($463 million) this week over how it processed location data through three features: Web & App Activity, Location History, and Location Accuracy, according to BleepingComputer. The regulator also ordered Google to bring its processing into compliance with GDPR within six months.

Farwave, an iPhone and iPad app, lets people find world radio stations by spinning a 3D globe to a region and tapping on a station, according to a 9to5Mac report published September 12 as part of the outlet's weekly Indie App Spotlight series. The Farwave app is free to download, with a subscription tier that adds podcasts, imported music, and other features.

Apple confirmed this week that Apple Podcasts Subscriptions video is coming, letting creators lock subscriber-exclusive episodes, ad-free video, early access, and bonus content behind the same paywall they already use for premium audio, across more than 170 countries and regions (9to5Mac, reported this week). The move would end an audio-only run that's lasted since Apple Podcasts Subscriptions launched in 2021, even though free video has already been playing in the app since March, when Apple...

Some Nest Doorbell owners outside the US are hearing their doorbell announcements delivered in an American accent, even though every other Google Home interaction on the same account still matches their configured language, according to Android Authority, two days ago. 9to5Google, citing Reddit reports it reviewed, describes the same Nest Doorbell American accent bug: Google Home announcing doorbell notifications in a US accent regardless of a user's set language or dialect, according to...

Oppo officially launched the Find X10 Pro Max in China today, and the headline spec is hard to miss: three separate 200MP sensors on the back, one each for ultrawide, main, and telephoto. The configuration is confirmed by GSMArena and FoneArena, both reporting on today's launch.

The Playground Games and Turn 10 Studios merger is official. Xbox is combining its two Forza studios into one team focused on the Forza and Fable franchises, according to a memo from Xbox chief content officer Matt Booty shared today (The Verge, today).