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The gear to get for your next winter adventure
Here's a list of the best outdoor tech you can buy for the winter, as chosen by Engadget editors.
Bose launches three new sunglasses with speakers for its Frames line
Tempo was made for sports, while Tenor and Soprano are for everyday use.
The best gifts for your dad, the outdoorsman
In honor of the dads who'd rather be camping, grilling or relaxing in the backyard, here are the best gifts you can get for Dad, the outdoorsman.
Samsung lets you enjoy nature with its 2,000-nit outdoor QLED TV
You can enjoy TV outdoors -- minus the glare from the sun -- with Samsung's new Terrace TV.
Is the Connect Smart Grilling Hub a great tool for outdoor cooking?
Weigh in on how well Weber's Connect Smart Grilling Hub works for outdoor cooking tasks!
The North Face’s high-tech Futurelight jackets are finally here
It uses a proprietary nanospinning technology that lets air move through fabric easily and according to the company offers more venting than ever before.
Tech that helped me fall back in love with birdwatching
A few months ago a friend of mine mentioned on Twitter she was getting into birding. And I thought, "I used to love birdwatching when I was little!" I'd go out and wander around with my little Golden Nature Guide and record sightings of the avians that made my large backyard their home. I rarely saw any birds and when I did see them, I had no idea what they were. I was a terrible birdwatcher. But now that I want to get back into the hobby, I don't have to be, thanks to modern technology that makes it feel more like playing a really advanced game of Pokémon Go. Here are some of the tools I've found most useful while walking through parks and forests searching for feathered friends.
Cannondale's electric mountain bikes offer more power for the trail
Cannondale has electrified a significant chunk of its bicycle lineup, and now it's determined to conquer the mountain biking world in earnest.
Summer boondocking gear: Car camping done right
Earlier this year I was infected with the #vanlife bug. Well, more like the #overlanding bug in my case, but I've been camping and working from the road for over a month now. I get to soak up this country's natural splendor and scurry after Slack notifications. But be warned, would-be digital nomads, this is no walk in the (national) park. I need a lot of gear, like solar panels, batteries, a refrigerator, cell boosters and tons more to make it happen. Here's what I took on the road for my first month (and why).
The best gear for your backyard party
Ah yes, sweet summertime. The few months of the year when your time is best spent outside, and that means time in the backyard, if you're blessed with one. Here's all the gear you need to turn your backyard into an outdoor summertime haven.
Engadget’s guide to all the outdoor gear you need this summer
If you're reading this at a desk, take a moment to stand up and locate your nearest window. You might see a street, a garden or even some fields. Whatever your current view, you are peering at the edge of the great outdoors, and adventure is beckoning. But this is Engadget, and we believe there aren't many things in life that a sprinkling of gear can't improve -- and that includes the time you typically reserve to escape a screen (ironic, we know).
Traeger makes built-in WiFi a standard grill feature
In 2017, Traeger added WiFi connectivity to its line of wood pellet grills with the Timberline series. While being able to control and monitor your grill remotely is more handy than you might think, the privilege was limited to two models with a starting price of $1,700. Sure, you could also send recipes from the company's app to the Timberline 850 and Timberline 1300 too, but that's still a big investment for a grill. Today, the company revealed its 2019 lineup, and the so-called WiFire technology is available across the board. And the best part is the most affordable model starts at $799.
The North Face teases its most breathable waterproof gear yet
As great as waterproof apparel is to keep you protected from bad weather, most jackets, pants and other gear tend to be too bulky or uncomfortable. That's a problem The North Face is well aware of, and it has come up with a new material that it believes will fix this: Futurelight, which the company is calling "the most advanced breathable waterproof outerwear technology." According to The North Face, Futurelight is its most comfortable waterproof gear yet, thanks to a design that lets air move through fabric more easily and provide "more venting than ever before.'
Traeger Timberline 850 review: BBQ goes high tech
Between chopping or hauling wood, shoveling coals and moving around large cuts of meat, it can be exhausting. But a little technology can help ease the relentless grind.
LynQ's location tracker helps find your friends outdoors
Enter LynQ, a handy little device that'll not only help you locate your friends and family in the great outdoors, but it might even save lives.
Engadget giveaway: Win an outdoors package with goTenna and more!
As we shake off the shackles of winter and ease into the more clement weather of spring and summer, it's time for travel plans to take shape. Enjoying the outdoors doesn't mean you have to ditch all the mod cons, though. This week, we have a trio of outdoors items for two winners that will let you keep the tech while you head off-the-grid. The goTenna Mesh communicator lets you stay in touch with others without a cell signal by sending texts and GPS details over radio waves. The radius of communication is a few miles when you're in the sticks, but can expand when there are more devices around. BioLite's Charge 20 is a rugged portable battery to help keep your phone and other devices topped up. And if you're out capturing footage with a camera, the GNARBOX storage unit and mobile editing software can turn some of those quiet hours in the outdoors into casual productivity without needing a laptop (iOS / Android). It even supports editing of 4K video and RAW photos. All you need to do is head to the Rafflecopter widget below for up to five chances at winning one of these outdoors tech packages including the goTenna Mesh, BioLite Charge 20 and GNARBOX editing set up. Good luck! Winners: Congratulations to Arin W. of West Lafayette, IN and Francis K. of Depew, NY!
Philips Hue lights will sync with music and games on your PC
Philips' team-up with Razer is just the start of Hue-to-PC syncing. The lighting behemoth is preparing to launch a Hue Sync app that will let you sync games, movies and music on any Windows 10 PC or High Sierra-equipped Mac. While the exact functionality is under wraps, it's easy to imagine turning the room blood red when you play death metal, or dimming the lights when you settle in for a Netflix marathon.
Our nights keep getting brighter
Our nights are getting brighter and they have been every year since 2012, according to a new study published today in Science Advances. Researchers led by Christopher Kyba at the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences used satellite imagery to track changes in nighttime outdoor artificial lighting around the world and they found that between 2012 and 2016, the amount of lit area grew by 2.2 percent per year. The amount of brightness from continuously lit areas also increased by 2.2 percent per year. So not only is more area being illuminated at night, already lit areas are getting even brighter. "We're losing more and more of the night on a planetary scale," said the journal's editor, Kip Hodges.
BioLite's FirePit goes beyond the camping grill
Relaxing and staring at fire is a primordial pleasure, but one that's often isolated to camping trips. It also inevitably leads to burger and hot dog cravings. While your average campfire -- a flaming stack of logs surrounded by rocks or rusty metal -- can be a challenge to cook on, BioLite's new FirePit provides a best-of-both-worlds solution. It's a portable grill station that doubles as a warming and hypnotic flame source, opening up opportunities beyond the campsite. The product is an 20-pound fire pit with folding legs and perforated "X-Ray Mesh" sides for heat distribution and flame visibility. There's also a Bluetooth-controllable fan attachment that helps expedite and regulate combustion, which is excellent for getting charcoal to red-hot ember status quickly. BioLite is introducing the $200 device on Kickstarter today with a May 2018 ship date, but I recently had a chance to check out one of the prototypes and eat a few tasty burgers along the way.
Gnarbox turns your phone into a 4K video-editing studio
It's an overcast day in San Francisco, and there's a drone buzzing high above the city. I'm with Tim Feess, the young co-founder of Gnarbox, a rugged portable video-editing tool that pairs with an app on your phone and works with multiple cameras and memory cards. Clouds might be lingering over the skyline, but Feess is unperturbed. He's confident that we can make a video of our afternoon that I'd not only be pleased with but would find a cinch to create. He brings the drone down, and we decide to find a more colorful spot to fly.
