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Toyota recalls 2.4 million hybrids over stalling risk
Toyota is facing a fresh setback after having to deal with a long line of faults relating to its hybrid cars over the past few years. Some Toyota Prius or Auris cars manufactured between 2008 and 2014 could be at risk of stalling when entering a fail-safe driving mode. The Japanese carmaker is now recalling 1.25 million cars in Japan, 830,000 in North America and 290,000 in Europe in order to fix the issue.
Toyota will stop selling diesel cars in Europe this year
You can officially add Toyota to the list of manufacturers dropping diesel from their passenger car lineups. The brand has confirmed that it's phasing out diesel passenger vehicles in Europe over the course of 2018, starting with cars like the Auris you see above -- your only choices for the hatchback are a modest 1.2L turbo 4-cylinder or 1.8L and 2.0L hybrid solutions. The company will keep diesel commercial vehicles like the Hilux truck, Land Cruiser SUV and Proace van to "meet customer needs," but that's as far as it goes.
Switched On: Android (tablet) inside
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. Inexpensive 7-inch tablets were everywhere in 2013 and became, as Switched On noted in December, a populist platform that fulfilled the promise of the sub-$100 PC. But despite their exceptional portability, aided by light weight and slim profiles, some may find the mere act of dragging them within range of something like their boombox, television or car to be too daunting a chore. Worry not, lazy but intrepid crowdfunders. Kickstarter has recently debuted a trio of products that integrate an Android tablet experience for your enhanced enjoyment, productivity and mobility.
Auris Skye turns your old 30-pin speaker dock into an AirPlay speaker
As Apple devices rapidly migrate to Lightning cables, you may have a few 30-pin docks with speakers around. While you could use something like Airfoil Speakers (a great app, I might add) to push sound around, attaching a US$300-plus device to an old dock seems excessive. Enter the Auris Skye -- a small device with built-in WiFi and a 30-pin connector that will allow you to set up your dock as an AirPlay speaker. The Skye itself is much smaller than an iPod touch, and surprisingly light. It needs no battery, and has one LED on top to indicate whether it is broadcasting or not. White means yes, orange means no. Setup requires attaching the Skye to a dock, waiting for the white LED to stop blinking, then using an app to finish setup. If the LED blinks orange, or the Skye's WiFi can't be found, you'll have to reset the device using a paperclip. More on this in a moment, as I feel it's one of the only issues with this product, but it's not always the product's fault. The Skye broadcasts its own WiFi, so you'll go to Settings and "join" its network, then launch the Skye app to complete setup. Once you've joined, it's a pretty simple matter of a few taps to get things going. Like a Sonos device, you can set up a Skye for the living room, bedroom, etc. and use labels to keep track. Once you find the Skye (which can take several minutes or a few restarts with a paperclip), you'll need to attach its WiFi to your home WiFi, then you're off to the races. From there you can close the Skye app and you'll see the device listed in your AirPlay options. That is, if it sticks. Unfortunately I had problems with the test unit I received. While the LED light indicated it was connected, for some reason the Skye would drop out and I had to reset, wait for the white light to stop blinking (about two minutes), and walk through the entire setup again. And again. And again. Part of this isn't really the device's fault, because if you change channels on your router or it reboots for any reason, the ad hoc network will break. Dropping out moments after setup, however, is a problem. I'm hoping it was more a concern with the prototype and that shipping units will be more reliable. In any event, the Auris Skye is a nice idea and it got plenty of funding during its Kickstarter run. Now you can pre-order one on the Auris site for $73.99 or get two for $139.98. Auris has a good return policy, so if you're having problems as I was, at least there's that.
Update your music dock to WiFi with the Auris Skye Kickstarter project
Let's face it -- a lot of people bought docks back in the days of iPods and the first iPhones. Basically, it made it very easy for people to blast tunes out of an alarm clock or speaker by just plugging the device in, and the device received a charge in the process. Well, things are different these days, and a lot of people would rather play with their iPhone or iPod touch while listening to music. So do you toss out the old dock? A new Kickstarter project wants to repurpose your dock by giving it WiFi powers. Auris has just launched a Kickstarter for a product called Skye with a US$56,000 goal of which they've already raised almost $18,000. Skye not only works with all of those 30-pin Dock Connector devices, adding a WiFi receiver to them for AirPlay and DLNA music streaming, but it can also be attached to just about any other sort of device. You can even beam to Skye via a peer-to-peer WiFi network if you don't own a router. There's an app under development for both iOS and Android that will provide a way to set up and control the little receiver. The Kickstarter page shows the Skye connected to a variety of different docks, as well as to stereo systems with 3.5mm inputs and standard RCA connectors. With a pledge of $64 or more, you get one of the devices, although some of the pledge levels are beginning to fill up quickly. Once the Kickstarter is over, the device will be available at a suggested retail price of $89. There's another great reason for Skye's existence: by using WiFi rather than Bluetooth, it improves the throughput of the music stream and the distance from which music can be beamed. Auris hopes to ship the first Skyes in December, so act now and give these folks your support.
