Wifi
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Apple starts selling Amazon's Eero mesh routers
You can buy Eero mesh WiFi routers directly from Apple -- yes, Amazon products.
Senators ask Comcast to open all its WiFi hotspots to students
Senators have called on Comcast to open up all its Xfinity WiFi hotspots to low-income students, not just those in public spaces.
Save $70 on Google's much-improved Nest WiFi bundle
Google's Nest Wifi router and access point bundle is on sale at Bed Bath and Beyond for $200.
Weber SmokeFire review: An intriguing work-in-progress
The SmokeFire EX4 ($999) looks like what you’d expect from a Weber pellet grill. However, on the SmokeFire grill, there’s room for improvement. The SmokeFire grills run on Weber Connect, which is built on JuneOS -- the same software that powers June’s smart ovens.
How to make your Wi-Fi suck less while working from home
By Joel Santo Domingo This post was done in partnership with Wirecutter. When readers choose to buy Wirecutter's independently chosen editorial picks, Wirecutter and Engadget may earn affiliate commission. Read the full blog how to make your wi-fi suck less while working from home. If your Wi-Fi cuts out when you're streaming a movie, it's a bummer. But if it happens while you're talking to your boss over Skype or giving a presentation via Zoom, it can feel like a calamity. Working from home means you may have to be your own IT department and manage your Internet connection so that you can access company resources, connect with colleagues, and prove you're not slacking off. You can fix some problems without spending a dime, but some issues require buying new hardware.
GM offers free, limited internet access in its connected cars
GM is offering owners of its connected cars free, limited WiFi access amid the COVID-19 pandemic. You can access the network anywhere within 50 yards of the vehicle.
Apple is reportedly aware of flaky Personal Hotspots in iOS 13
Apple hasn't entirely escaped the flurry of iOS 13 glitches, it seems. MacRumors has reportedly obtained support documents acknowledging ongoing connection problems with the Personal Hotspot feature in iOS 13 and its iPadOS 13 counterpart. Affected users either disconnect frequently or can't connect at all -- a significant problem if you're counting on your device's hotspot as a backup connection. It's not certain just when the issue first manifested, although iPhone and iPad users have reported issues as far back as iOS 13.1.2.
Spectrum offers free internet so students can do classwork at home
With school systems across the US closing down in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Spectrum says it will provide free internet access to students who currently don't use its service. The company will install broadband and WiFi in new student households free of charge and provide access for 60 days. The offer is available to families with both K-12 and college students.
US wireless carriers pledge to suspend cancellations amid outbreak
One day after Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel called on the FCC to take aggressive action in response to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, the federal agency has announced the Keep Americans Connected Pledge. For the next 60 days, the agreement calls on telecom companies to maintain service and waive late fees for any residential and small business customers who can't pay their bills due to the pandemic. It also calls on those companies to open their WiFi hotspots.
Eero's mesh WiFi routers now support Apple HomeKit
Eero has acted on its promise of supporting HomeKit for Routers. You can now add any Eero, Eero Pro or Eero Beacon device running eeroOS 3.18.0 (or later) to Apple's Home app, letting the mesh WiFi routers firewall your smart home devices so that a vulnerability in one doesn't compromise your entire local network. You can allow gadgets to communicate automatically with the devices their manufacturers approve, limit them to HomeKit or remove all restrictions if necessary.
Facebook's gigabit wireless rolls out in Puerto Rico
Facebook's Terragraph WiFi technology is delivering high-speed broadband to San Juan, Puerto Rico. This week, AeroNet, Puerto Rico's internet service provider, announced a six-month Terragraph pilot meant to deliver reliable, affordable high-speed service. It's now live in and near Plaza de Armas and Plaza San Jose in Old San Juan.
Traeger's Ironwood smart grills now ship with a handy pellet supply sensor
If Traeger's Ironwood series caught your eye, the company is now including a handy feature in the box, rather than making it a separate purchase. Traeger is now shipping its WiFi-equipped Ironwood 650 ($1,200) and Ironwood 885 ($1,500) pellet grills with the pellet sensor add-on that it announced in November. Until now, you had to pay $80 to get one of these for your backyard barbecue machine. And, sadly, if you own one of the 2019 Pro Series grills, you still do.
Google is ending its Station free public WiFi program
After almost four years of providing free internet access to people in developing countries, Google plans to shut down its Station program. The initiative saw the search giant offer free public WiFi at 400 railway stations in India and more than 5,000 other places around the world, including in Brazil, South Africa, Mexico, Thailand and Vietnam. News of the shutdown started to filter out last week, but Google officially confirmed the news on Monday.
Drone network provides early warnings for natural disasters
Drones might soon deliver a heads-up when natural disasters are about to strike. Researchers have developed a communication system that uses a drone network to provide early warnings for disasters. The challenge wasn't so much the drone-to-drone communication as the battery life. Where a typical hobbyist drone rarely lasts more than half an hour in the air, a smarter resource allocation method helps this system lasts three to five longer while covering a large area. The drones can also form a WiFi hotspot that keeps people online when conventional infrastructure has fallen apart.
MIT's 'smart surface' could improve your WiFi signal tenfold
There's a problem with stuffing wireless connections into ever-smaller devices: they can struggle to maintain a good signal when there's so little space for antennas. MIT CSAIL researchers might have a fix, though. They've developed an RFocus "smart surface" that "can work both as a mirror or a lens" to focus radio signals onto the right devices on either side of the "fence." In return, this improves the median signal strength by nearly 10 times, while doubling the median channel capacity in an office environment. Instead of just a handful of monolithic antennas, the RFocus prototype revolves around 3,000-plus tiny antennas with software that arranges them to maximize reception. In other words, RFocus is acting as a beamforming controller in the middle, as opposed to letting the radio endpoints -- transmitters and client devices -- manage this activity, which would be difficult to implement on tiny devices.
Apple must pay $838 million for infringing CalTech's WiFi patents
The California Institute of Technology (CalTech) has won a $1.1 billion jury verdict against Apple and Broadcom, according to Reuters and other sources. In a case that first hit federal courts in 2016, CalTech accused Apple of using Broadcom WiFi chips that violate four of its patents in all iPhones, starting around 2012. The jury reportedly ordered Apple alone to pay $838 million, or about $1.40 per device -- which works out to about 598 million gadgets that used the infringing chips.
Apple's latest iPad is back down to $250 in Amazon's tablet sale
Amazon has slashed prices across Apple's range of iPads, and there are savings to be had whatever model you might be in the market for. The $250 10.2 inch 32GB deal is back again -- great for people on a budget. It's not the lowest price ever, but a saving of $79 off the usual list price is not to be sneezed at.
Kwikset’s latest smart lock recognizes your fingerprint
Forget using an app or security code to access your smart lock -- Kwikset's new Halo Touch smart lock is fingerprint-enabled. The device stores up to 100 fingerprints from 50 users and offers one-touch locking and unlocking.
D-Link's latest routers pack WiFi 6 and mesh networking
It wouldn't be CES without an avalanche of WiFi routers, and D-Link is certainly contributing its share. It's coming to the show with no less than nine (!) offerings, all of which include mesh networking to help set up strong coverage across a whole home. They also have "enhanced," profile-driven parental controls that are reportedly easy to set up, and five models support the added speed of WiFi 6 if you're looking to future-proof your network.
Google Nest Hub and WiFi are on sale for the holidays
If you're still trying to finish your holiday shopping, Best Buy has an intriguing offer. The retailer is currently offering a Nest Hub two-pack for $100. Normally, if you were to buy two of them separately, they would cost you $260.
