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The biggest news from IFA 2018
We're wrapping up our coverage of IFA 2018, and things just seemed... quieter in comparison to last year. There were next to no new wearable announcements, plenty of mid-range phones, but only one premium smartphone. Meanwhile, PCs followed the trend seen at both CES and CEATEC, with shrinking bezels on high-spec laptops from ASUS. Your go-to IFA topics (huge TVs, curious home appliances and mobility tech) only had a few things to show off. That said, there were new moves in audio -- especially if you're in the market for wireless headphones or smart speakers -- and Samsung brings 8K TVs one step closer to reality. We sum up everything worth knowing from last week in Berlin. It's the best of IFA 2018.
Will 2018 be the year small phones die?
Sony is perhaps the last bastion of smaller smartphones. Or at least, it used to be. For years now, Sony has been making "Compact" versions of its top-tier handsets that are more or less flagships in their own right. Each generation of Sony's latest XZ series of phones hasn't deviated from this tradition until IFA 2018, where Sony announced the new Xperia XZ3, but no XZ3 Compact. Has the appetite for smaller phones finally vanished? Or are manufacturers content to let the hungry starve either way?
Here are all the new phones at IFA that you won't get in the US
I know what you're thinking: Why should you care about a bunch of phones you might never get to buy? Well, in addition to feeding your FOMO, it's also worth learning about technologies available elsewhere in the world. Things that first showed up abroad (think: all-screen phones) have a habit of showing up stateside after some time. There are already a few phones in other countries that offer advanced features like in-screen fingerprint readers that we're expecting to arrive in the US soon. Granted, the phones we saw at IFA weren't groundbreaking flagship devices, but it's still worth noting what we're missing out on. Fasten your seatbelts, close your tray tables and return your seats to the upright position and join me on this journey around the world.
Segway's Drift e-skates aren't nearly as dangerous as they look
Disgraceful name appropriation aside, hoverboards have blessed us with many an exploitative YouTube compilation. And given the number of bruised coccyxes hoverboards are responsible for, you'd think splitting them into two separate pieces would make for double the danger. Nevertheless, e-skates exist, and what better company to take them mainstream than Segway? The quirky transportation company is due to ship its Drift W1s any day now, and IFA attendees were invited to try them out on a little roller rink Segway had built on the show floor in Berlin. Much to my relief, they are far from the deathtrap they appear, and while they probably won't be suitable for your daily commute, they're a lot of fun all the same.
A proper explanation of Google’s Android One program
I must admit I didn't know much about Android One before coming to IFA 2018. I had assumed it was some form of software or set of specifications for midrange phones, although a lot of people around me were also confusing it with Android Go. Android One is neither of those things. If you're here expecting an Android Go explainer, sorry. Best go live your life now. This is not the (An)droid you're looking for.
8K TVs are coming, but ignore the hype
It's time to throw out your 4K TV, 8K is here! Well, not quite. At IFA in Berlin this week, Samsung, LG and TCL showed off their upcoming 8K sets. It's like a flashback to the early days of 4K in 2013 -- all of a sudden the video format we've been hearing about for years is finally gearing up to reach consumers. Samsung is planning to actually sell its 8K QLED TV, LG gave us a glimpse at the world's first 8K OLED TV. But is this actually a huge leap beyond 4K? That's where things get complicated.
Save me, water-powered eye massager
After days of fighting crowds and trudging through miles of IFA's chaotic show floor, I just needed a break. I found my oasis in Aurai's water-powered eye massager. It's exactly what it sounds like: A small $239 headset that rubs your eyes with pulsating water jets. And on top of that, it can also alternate between warming and cooling modes. It's something Aurai has been working on for years, following a lengthy crowdfunding campaign. Now, the company is also gearing up for a more portable model, the Rio, which it plans to release in the first quarter of 2019 for between $150 and $175.
Sony's new HX99 compact camera does things your smartphone can't
At a time when everyone is carrying around a generally capable camera inside their smartphone, compact cameras have struggled to stay relevant. Barring Sony's own wonderful RX100 series and Fujifilm's X100F family, the world of point-and-shoots is usually an unremarkable one. Sony's only camera announcements at IFA 2018 were intriguing, at least. It revealed two cameras, the Cybershot HX99 and HX95, which cram a technically impressive 30x, 24-720mm f/3.5-6 equivalent zoom lens into a 1.5-inch wide camera frame that feels very similar to the premium RX100 series. Both compacts join the Cybershot camera family, meaning they are cheaper than Sony's aforementioned premium compact camera series. The HX99 -- the one I tested -- is priced at €520 (around $610), making it pretty much half the price of the latest RX100 models.
RHA's high-end planar magnetic earbuds sound incredible
Planar magnetic headphones don't use the magnet-and-coil driver typical to most cans. Instead, they use a fixed but flexible diaphragm that undulates to create sound. RHA is the first company to concentrate this technology into wireless earbuds (the kind that are tethered to a Bluetooth collar that hangs around your neck). The CL2 Planar earphones are an impressive, and expensive, engineering feat, but how do they sound?
Honor’s Play gaming phone is far from perfect for 'PUBG'
The new Honor Play is business as usual for Huawei's under-brand. A marriage of surprisingly good specs, premium-esque design and a mid-range price tag is Honor's modus operandi, but the Play was created with a specific demographic in mind: The avid mobile gamer. While most phones are more than capable of running games, the Play has a couple of special features that are supposed to give you, the player, an advantage over the competition.
This audacious curved-screen wearable has a gaudy camera
Just as Google is making Wear OS feel less like a smartphone system squeezed onto a watch, ZTE spinoff Nubia wants to slap a full phone on your wrist. At IFA 2018, the company unveiled a prototype device called the Nubia-A, which it's touting as a "wearable smartphone". That, to me, means smartwatch, but given the way companies like Apple, Google and Qualcomm seem to be moving away from wrist-worn smartphone wannabes, my definition might be inaccurate soon. Feast your eyes on this fascinating oddity, though you might want to avoid looking directly at the monstrous onboard camera.
Earin finally releases its M-2 true wireless earbuds
At CES 2017, Earin unveiled a revamped version of its true wireless earbuds, called M-2. Over a year and a half later, you can finally get your hands on them. The company was an early entrant into the completely wireless earbud market and although we had reservations about the earlier model, perhaps some of the features M-2 packs in could mean Earin has improved its product from the previous generation.
Get a fridge that helps you sous vide
Sharp's newest fridge freezer doesn't have a water fountain or a voice assistant. Instead it houses a vacuum-packing slot that will help keep produce fresh for longer, reduce food waste (leftovers!) and, yes, even prep food for that millennial cooking style of choice -- sous vide. The VacPac Pro fridge-freezer had its debut at IFA 2018, and doesn't require proprietary bags. You can use any sealer bag, and the slot will suck out the air at the touch of a button -- which we proceeded to do on some plastic fruit.
Huawei's new P20 Pro color options add some sophistication
The P20 Pro is arguably the best camera phone out there. However, the main color option you'll find in (non-US) stores and websites is the divisive purple-blue-pink oil-slick effect. Eye-catching? Yes. For everyone? Less so. Alongside all the news of high-end mobile chips and far too familiar-looking smart speakers, the company revealed a selection of new options. We think the leather-backed black and brown P20 Pro models are pretty darn slick, upgrading the phone from anonymous big smartphone to classy hardware.
Razer's THX-enabled headset helps you locate sneaky enemies
Razer has unveiled a headset that makes the best use of its THX acquisition so far by letting you know where your enemies are coming from. The Kraken Tournament Edition is the first product with THX Spatial Audio that plays sounds from all around you with "pinpoint accuracy" and adjusts when you turn your head. It can also auto-detect audio formats, let you set up a personal profile with parameters like voice clarity and bass boost and find just the right balance between game and chat volumes.
Sony's FES team and New Balance made an e-paper sneaker
The FES Watch was an e-paper fashion accessory borne out of Sony's interesting idea incubator, First Flight. It was one of the earliest products to make it onto Sony's domestic crowdfunding platform, and it was successful enough to warrant a second-generation product, the more intricate FES Watch U. It's rare to see the e-paper timepieces outside of Japan, but the FES team are here at Sony's IFA booth with a new concept product: A sneaker with e-ink soles and side detailing created in collaboration with New Balance.
Samsung found a new smart home evangelist in 'Family Guy'
Samsung gives me smart home fatigue. Enough about Smart Things, enough about how a thousands-of-dollars TV can connect to a new thousand-dollar fridge or washing machine. Enough beautiful families showcasing features in beautiful houses that I can only dream of living in. Samsung's leaning on augmented reality and some Family Guy branding to show the kind of tasks that can be accomplished with connected home assistance -- and make it a little more, well, friendly. With Samsung Galaxy Note 9 in hand, I pointed the camera at an AR doormat to calibrate to the empty room, transforming it into the Griffin household you know and love/tolerate.
Huawei's 7nm Kirin 980 chip could give Qualcomm reason to worry
The race to deliver a seven-nanometer chip is heated, and Huawei has just proclaimed itself the winner. The company just unveiled its Kirin 980 CPU here at IFA 2018, and says it is the world's first commercial 7nm system-on-chip (SoC). But that's not the new processor's only claim for the record books: The 980 is also the first to use Cortex-A76 cores, dual neural processing units, the Mali G76 GPU, a 1.4 Gbps LTE modem as well as support faster RAM. Whew. That's a lot.
Huawei will unveil the Mate 20 on October 16
After showing off its latest mobile processor and a smart speaker-router hybrid that looks just like the Google Home, Huawei left its IFA audience with one more little nugget to chew upon. CEO Richard Yu announced that its upcoming Mate 20 flagship will be unveiled in London on October 16 and sport the just-unveiled Kirin 980 chipset.
Huawei's Google Home clone has Alexa inside
When Samsung launched the Galaxy Home speaker earlier this month, people were quick to point out how its name seemed ripped off from Google. Not to be outdone, Huawei is unveiling its own AI speaker here at IFA 2018, and it's clearly borrowed much more from the Google Home... just not the name. The AI Cube is a cylindrical speaker that looks like a stretched out version of Google's device, though it will offer Amazon's Alexa instead of Assistant. Like Samsung, Huawei is promising high-quality audio on its speaker. That's not all -- the AI Cube is also a 4G router.
