Author: Brett Venter

Chinese brand Dreame is set on diversifying as quickly as possible. First, it was robot vacuums, then power banks, then hypercars(?)… now there’s Dreame’s 8K Leaptic Cube action camera to look out for. And it’s not just the action cam, either. The company has also announced two wearables, its AI Glasses and an AI Ring, that, in conjunction with the 8K camera, “[redefine] the very essence of ‘recording.” Their words, not ours. Look before you Leaptic The Leaptic Cube consists of a main control unit with a display and controls (and, likely, much of the innards), and a detachable 8K…

Everybody wants a slice of the fresh AI pie, and Asus is offering regular folks the chance to run their own AIs locally. Probably businesses, first and foremost, but there’s bound to be a few units of its new “USB edge AI accelerator” kicking around nerds’ homes soon. Asus on TOPS again The full name for this handy little AI gadget is the Asus UGen300 USB AI Accelerator. It’s designed to plug into a computer and ramp up its artificial intelligence capabilities, augmenting existing processor-based NPUs with an extra 40 TOPS (trillion operations per second). The UGen300 doesn’t look like…

Motorola’s revamped Razr, which recently became available in South Africa, will soon be joined by the Razr Fold, the first of the company’s book-style folding smartphones. The handset appeared at CES and is set for launch later this year, but all the details are already known. It seems Samsung has competition on its hands in 2026. We can make guesses as to how the South Korean company will handle the new threat, but several successive generations of Galaxy Fold suggest that Samsung probably won’t be too stressed. Even if it has largely made the same phone for the past couple…

One of the largest concerns with creating functional AI is powering the data centres. Meta and others are looking to nuclear energy to realise their ambitions, with the social media giant announcing new partnerships that will see the companies creating up to 6.6GW of power from various nuclear projects over the next ten years. According to the company, its new partnerships will “extend and expand the operation of three nuclear power plants, boost the development of new advanced nuclear technology, and foster job growth” in the US. The upshot is that its AI will have enough power to get around…

Fitness app Strava has, just in time for New Year’s resolution time, come out with a shiny new feature for its users. The company might be counting on that tendency to scoop up some extra revenue because the feature, Instant Workouts, is tucked away behind a monthly subscription. If you’re already a paying user — and many of Strava’s user base are — that’s not much of a problem. But if you’re trying to skate by on the free tier, you’ll have to shell out at least R90/m to access the new automatic workouts. Strava to be your best The…

Asus’ Zenbook Duo lineup has languished over the past couple of years, but that’s about to change. The company announced a new version of its fully double-screened notebook for launch later in 2026. The good news for fans of the somewhat unusual? South Africa will get a crack at it, too. Exactly when and how much it’ll cost is up in the air, but it should be here before the middle of the year. The last time we saw one like this was in 2024, when the hardware was priced at R43,000. We can probably expect similar levels of cost…

Tech tends to focus on… let’s call them ‘frivolous’ uses. Every so often, though, something like PreEvnt’s Isaac comes along. This gadget is designed to hang around its user’s neck, and was created for diabetics (both Type 1 and Type 2) to help them monitor their glucose levels. This might not seem like a big deal. Glucose monitors are available at every chemist, after all. But Isaac is unique in that it uses a person’s breath to perform its monitoring checks. That dispenses with the needles and strips and that little beepy machine that doesn’t really fit into a pocket.…

Fender has a serious reputation in the audio world, although it’s been mostly associated with guitars, amps, speaker stacks, and Bluetooth speakers. Fender has chosen this year to release its all-new Mix — the company’s first pair of over-ear Bluetooth headphones. The new overs are a far cry from the rock god-like status of even the company’s official Lego set, however. In terms of design, they don’t deviate far from recent headphones from Sony, Bowers and Wilkins, and others. Inside, on the other hand… Into the Mix The Fender Mix might appeal more to ordinary people than to those who…

They grow up so fast. Boston Dynamics’ Atlas has travelled a long road, eventually winding up in a warehouse sorting car parts. That’s the fate of many young humanoids, but eventually they go on to get a real job. That’s also the case for this robotic assistant. Atlas is about to enter production, and its first two roles are already secured. The humanoid robot’s transition from experimental hardware to enterprise product will see it working at Google’s DeepMind facility as well as owner Hyundai’s vehicle factories. World, meet Atlas The Google DeepMind deployment makes a worrisome sort of sense, since…

It was only a matter of time before OpenAI came for more of your data. ChatGPT Health is the latest new function for the AI chatbot, one that “securely brings your health information and ChatGPT’s intelligence together,” according to the company. OpenAI is clear that the new addition to ChatGPT’s repertoire isn’t supposed to replace your doctor in any way. What OpenAI says and what people actually do with the new Health function is another matter entirely. ChatGPT Health, check ChatGPT Health is supposed to tie together all of the various health data-gathering users do. Apple Health, Function, MyFitnessPal, Weight…