Author: Stuff writer

Honor was a strange beneficiary of the ongoing trade wars between China and the US. Hampered by an inability to source chips on a mass scale, Chinese tech giant Huawei was forced to sell off one of its fastest-growing brands in 2020. Since then, Honor has accelerated its expansion into the global market, and in 2023 the company has put more focus on South Africa. The Honor Watch series is the company’s foray into smartwatches intended to compete with other Chinese giants. The Honor Watch GS 3 is another such release in the series. Let’s take a look into what…

So you’ve gone full retro this time, to the point that this console has actual woodgrain. It does scream 1970s – but that was the point. This was home gaming, so it was decided the VCS (renamed the Atari 2600 in 1982) should work with your home decor. It was pioneering in other ways too, with external cartridges killing off the standalone TV games that had until then been popular. And, despite a lacklustre start, Atari stuck with its console – unlike rival Fairchild, which quickly dumped its Channel F system thinking gaming would be a fad. Whoops. And that…

That there is a camera. Why’s it special? It looks far too normal for this page. To borrow a phrase, the Samsung Galaxy NX was ‘business in front, party in the back’. To the untrained eye, it looked like any other mid-range camera. You could mount lenses, prod a button to take a snap, and revel in the large (for the time) 20MP sensor. But spin the thing around and you were bathed in the glow of a 4.8in touchscreen. And that existed because this was the world’s first mirrorless interchangeable-lens camera to run Android. You know, the phone OS.…

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 is the latest foldable flagship from the South Korean tech giant. As the number in the name suggests, it’s the fifth from the company using the book-fold form factor. With all that experience, it shouldn’t be surprising that Samsung dominates this market segment in South Africa. This is probably a large part of the reason other brands don’t bring their foldables here. A familiar 7.6in AMOLED display resides at the centre of the Galaxy Z Fold 5, with a 120Hz refresh rate and a peak brightness of 1,750 nits. When you don’t need to…

Beta Yourself is all about improving your skills in one sphere or another. No matter how good you are at one, there’s always something new to learn. That tracks over to something as seemingly innocuous as working from home. The pandemic shutdown showed most of the world just how hard it actually is to spend time away from other human beings. It’s not all waking up late and doing meetings while still wearing your fuzzy slippers. That’s why Stuff has the tips you need to make the most out of not having to drive into the office every day. A…

If you’re using a smartphone with ‘Ultra’ appended to the end of it, it better be incredible. That’s the case with Samsung’s Galaxy S23 Ultra, which has edged out last year’s Samsung headliner as the best Android we’ve ever laid hands on. But a few months is a long time in tech and the S23 Ultra is getting a bit long in the tooth and slower in the processor. Okay, not really, but it’s still worth doing what you can to spruce up an already excellent device if you’ve got the ability. Given the original price for entry, it’s not…

There are apps for everything now. Even the (currently) most advanced software tech is available in smartphone app form. Better still, it won’t cost you a cent unless you want it to — so if you’re hoping to use artificial intelligence professionally you’ve got yet another subscription fee in your near future. But if you’re just a dabbler or curious about what life under our future AI overlords look like, there are a bunch of free apps to interact with. These are no slouches either. In this edition of Mini Meme, we’ve got a bunch of the best (free) smartphone…

Huawei’s latest intelligent wearable, the Watch GT 4, is the perfect companion for a stylish and healthy lifestyle. It’s available in 46mm and 41mm models with five distinct design options to choose from. Both models feature Huawei’s improved TruSeen 5.5+ health indicator monitoring technology, as well as the upgraded TruSleep 3.0 suite of sleep tracking and monitoring tech. If you’re the sporty type, it supports over 100 sports modes. Experience the fashion-forward devices fresh out the box and hear more about the specs and functions on offer in our unboxing and first impressions video. The Huawei Watch GT 4 46mm…

The Sonos Era 300 represents exactly what the name suggests – a new era for Sonos. While the Era 100 is a direct replacement for the Sonos One, the Era 300 is the start of something new. Sonos claims it doesn’t replace the Five (R15,000) and we’re inclined to agree. The Sonos Five can’t match the Era 300’s spatial audio smarts even if it wanted to, especially not at R13,000. If you’re keen on getting your foot in the spatial audio door, then the Era 300 is not optional. Like the Five, you can seamlessly pair two Era 300s for…

It takes something especially powerful to take the concept of space and make it boring. There’s arguably nothing more exciting than the idea of exploring what lies out in the great beyond; it’s a fantasy that many popular sci-fi stories have attempted to capture to varying degrees of success. Following in the footsteps of No Man’s Sky and Elite Dangerous, Bethesda’s Starfield is the latest game to try to make good on the promise of intergalactic escapades and while it succeeds in some respects, many baffling decisions rooted in outdated design hold it back from capitalizing on the call of…