Gadget Hacks: Page 12

Pixel Watch 3 and 4 owners are hitting a hard wall this week: tap the Find My Phone shortcut, get a brief splash screen, then land right back at the watch face. Nothing rings. Rebooting both the watch and the paired phone does nothing. Google has acknowledged the bug and says a fix is coming in a future update, but has given no timeline.

Google has been rolling out Gemini to Google TV hardware since late 2025, but if you own an older Chromecast with Google TV dongle and are waiting for a Chromecast with Google TV Gemini update, the honest answer is that Google hasn't committed to one. Every confirmed rollout wave has named specific hardware. Older Chromecast devices haven't appeared on any of those lists.

Video filters have disappeared from Samsung's camera app in One UI 8.5 and the One UI 9 beta quietly, with no announcement from Samsung and no explanation of whether it's a bug or a deliberate cut. Android Central reported the issue this week after Reddit users flagged missing video filters on One UI 8.5, and said it confirmed the missing recording filters on a Galaxy S25 Ultra.

Motorola Quick Launch lets you double-tap the back of your phone to trigger a custom action without touching the screen. According to AT&T's support page for the Razr+ 2025, when Quick Launch is enabled, you can double-tap the back to perform certain options like taking a screenshot or returning to the home screen. That phrasing matters: "certain options like" is not an exhaustive list, and this guide covers what AT&T explicitly documents.

Moto G Stylus 2026 Review: Great Stylus, Weak Support Promise

Motorola Razr Ultra 2026 Leaked Promo Video: Specs, Price, and Launch Details

How GHG Protocol's Scope 3 Overhaul Reshapes Apple and Amazon Greenhouse Emissions Reporting

2026 Apple TV 4K Rumors: A17 Pro, Siri Delay, and Release Window

Samsung Certified Re-Newed Galaxy Z Fold7 and Z Flip7: What Buyers Should Know

Why Android OEMs Should Worry as Apple Redefines Premium Hardware

Google TV and Android TV together now run on 300 million active devices globally, according to 9to5Google's reporting from I/O. The Google TV 300 million active devices figure is real. It is also the kind of number that looks better in a press release than it does under scrutiny.

Samsung is expected to break from its one-foldable-per-year pattern this summer, with leaks pointing to two book-style devices under the Fold family: the Galaxy Z Fold 8 and a companion model called the Galaxy Z Fold 8 Wide. The earlier reviewed sources did not use "Ultra" for either device, though newer leak coverage has since applied the Ultra name to the taller Fold-style model.

How Apple prevents product leaks before launch: the 3-layer system

YouTube Livestream Ads Update Pauses Ads at Peak Chat Moments

If menu bar icons are vanishing on your notch-equipped Mac, two Terminal commands can recover the hidden space by reducing the gap between icons from the default 16 points to 8. No third-party software required. This guide walks through that fix, the revert path, why the problem exists, and what to try if tighter spacing still isn't enough.

The Motorola Razr Plus 2026 costs $1,099. Same chip as the last two Razr Plus generations. Same basic design and dimensions as recent Razr Plus models. One color. A reasonable person glancing at a spec sheet would walk away.

Vibe Coding on Android: What Google AI Studio Can Do Today

Some Fitbit Air pre-orders began arriving recently, a full day ahead of the official May 26 launch. For iPhone owners, that was a welcome surprise. For Android buyers, it meant unpacking a $99.99 tracker they couldn't use.

If you're trying to figure out how to reset YouTube recommendations, here's the frustrating truth: there's no single button that fixes it. YouTube's feed pulls from several independent systems at once what it's designed to show you, what it infers from your viewing behavior, and the explicit feedback you've given it over the years. Clear your history, and the feed barely moves. That's because history and your "Not interested" signals are tracked as separate systems, and clearing one doesn't...

Apple's next high-end laptop may not be called MacBook Pro at all. According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple is weighing "MacBook Ultra" branding for a redesigned flagship that would sit above the existing Pro line, with M5 Pro and M5 Max models continuing to sell alongside it. Five features define the rumored machine: a tandem OLED display, touchscreen input, a thinner chassis, M6 Pro/Max chips on 2nm silicon, and a Dynamic Island replacing the current notch.

Oppo just launched the Reno 16 series alongside its "Bubble," a touch-capable magnetic rear screen phone accessory that snaps to the back of a compatible phone and delivers something close to the secondary display Xiaomi built directly into the 17 Pro.

The Razr Fold has one clear hardware distinction over Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold7: active stylus support on both of its displays. The Moto Pen Ultra features on Razr Fold span handwritten notes and pressure-sensitive sketching to on-screen search and cross-device syncing. The Galaxy Z Fold7, at $1,999, offers none of it.

Reviewed by Julianne Ngirngir

Samsung Galaxy Connect Now Works on Any Windows 11 PC

Pixel Watch Fall Detection and Google Account Sign-In Requirements Explained

Samsung Galaxy Glasses Launch: Battery Cert Points to 2026 Release

Kansas City Public Schools is moving toward an "all-Apple district," with KCPS saying in a May 19 update that it has procured more than 4,500 MacBook Neos for students in 8th grade and up. The district says the broader plan is to replace more than 30,000 Windows PCs and Chromebooks over time, while younger grades continue using existing iPads and MacBook Airs.

The Trump administration has directed agency chief information officers across the executive branch to install its official app on all government-furnished mobile phones, with the FAA already notifying employees that the installation will happen automatically on all FAA-issued iPhones and iPads, according to internal communications obtained by Government Executive earlier this month. Current and former federal officials called the move highly unusual. Sonny Hashmi, a former senior government IT...

In March 2025, second-generation Chromecast and Chromecast Audio units stopped working. Owners woke up to an "Untrusted Device" error and a reasonable assumption: Google had simply let discontinued hardware die. Within a week, Google deployed a Chromecast fix, emailed affected users directly, and brought decade-old hardware back online. This week, Google clarified what that intervention actually was.

Nearly 700 ad-free titles are now streamable across 135 countries, but eligibility, scope, and what stays Audible-only are worth understanding before you assume full access.

Samsung's One UI 8.5 quietly dropped a camera feature that users have had for years: native video filters in the stock camera app are gone from Video mode. The update, which brings Samsung's latest Galaxy AI and creative tools to more Galaxy devices, carried no public explanation for the removal, and no changelog entry mentions it. Samsung began the official One UI 8.5 rollout on May 6, 2026, starting in Korea, with additional regions and models following afterward.

Microsoft has made two distinct bets on how Office work should start and progress. The first: users should generate documents, spreadsheets, and presentations from a chat interface before they ever open an app. The second: once inside Word, Excel, or PowerPoint, Copilot should edit files directly rather than queue up suggestions for a person to apply. Both are now live, moving Copilot from a sidebar assistant toward both file creation in chat and direct editing inside apps. Access is broad, but...

Google briefly appeared to mark several older Chromecast models as no longer receiving critical security updates, but the company now says that was a mistake. Google told 9to5Google that the page had incorrectly indicated legacy Chromecast devices were being deprecated, and Google's current Nest security page again lists those models as still receiving critical security updates.

Before diving in, a quick map of which steps apply to you:

Code found in Apple's backend suggests the iOS 27 Apple Wallet Create a Pass feature would let users scan physical cards and tickets to generate digital passes, bypassing the usual requirement for businesses to build native Wallet support. 9to5Mac and MacRumors first reported the backend-code findings on April 16, 2026, after developer Nicolás Alvarez discovered the functions; later reporting in early May added the more specific "Create a Pass" framing.

Microsoft says its agentic capabilities for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint reached general availability on April 22, 2026, after a scheduled PowerPoint rollout that began on the web in mid-March and was expected to finish across Windows and Mac by the end of April. For PowerPoint specifically, the update replaces a static suggestion panel with a conversational editing mode that rewrites, restructures, and translates slides directly through chat.

The HONOR Power2 went on sale in China on January 9, 2026, making it HONOR's latest major entry in the 10,000mAh phone category after the HONOR WIN series, as reported by Gadgets 360. It starts at 2,699 yuan, or about $386, and no global release has been announced.

Apple is closing three retail stores in June. At two of them, workers are getting transfer rights to nearby locations. At the third the Towson, Maryland store that became Apple's first unionized U.S. retail location in 2022 roughly 90 employees were told to reapply through the same open process as outside candidates. As of late April, not one of them had landed a job at another Apple store, Bloomberg Law reported last month. That is the Apple Towson store closure protest in a sentence: the only...

Motorola's 2026 Razr lineup goes on sale today, and US carriers are competing on who can make the sticker prices disappear fastest. Motorola Razr carrier deals hitting stores this week follow a familiar structure: headline "free phone" offers built on 36-month financing agreements that require a premium plan to deliver the credit. Before accepting any of them, the plan math is worth running.

Tipster Debayan Roy has ruled out a June or July launch for the CMF Phone 3 Pro, pushing the expected window to August or September. GSMArena reported the tip yesterday; Gadgets360 followed today. That puts the CMF Phone 3 Pro launch date roughly three to four months later than the April cadence CMF set when the Phone 2 Pro debuted last year.