Smartphones & Accessories

Sometimes two products work together so well that they mesh into an extension of one another and become that much better than either is on its own. Each might be pretty cool, but together, they becomes something special. That’s the case with Samsung’s Galaxy S5 smartphone and its Galaxy Fit fitness band. I had a week to try out these Samsung flagship devices and came away impressed with how well the two combine into what’s currently one of the best experiences out there for someone with an active, connected lifestyle.

Let your tween share all her fun moments with the SELPHY CP910 printer from Canon. This compact and portable printer is designed to print out all those selfies, instagram and smartphone photos using a wireless connection.   Get all those cherished photos out of the phone and into your photo albums or scrapbook . It’s the perfect gift for the tween girl in your life. Hand this over and you’ll be the cool adult in her life.

The cell phone has quickly become the focal point of our mobile communications. With the power of a computer in your hand, a display with a resolution on par with HDTV, LTE data speeds that rival your home broadband Internet connection, a high quality camera, gaming capabilities at the level of previous generation consoles, massive amounts of onboard storage, multiple connectivity options and cloud-based synchronization of your services, the smartphone can quickly become an irreplaceable part of your life.

We’re in a golden age of home movies thanks to the built-in video shooting capability of most mobile phones and there are people making big bucks posting professional looking videos on sites like YouTube —that are shot on their smartphone. How do you go from shaky, raw smartphone footage to polished looking results with subtitles, special effects and animated overlays? It’s actually pretty easy and the best part is, you can pump up your phone footage with movie effects for next to nothing and sometimes even for free.

Last year, HTC had a hit with its HTC One, considered by many to be the best-looking Android smartphone ever released, not to mention a solid performer. Samsung’s Galaxy S4 ended up running away with the Android sales crown in 2013, but HTC is back this year with the One M8, a successor that’s bigger, looks even better and offers solid performance combined with an innovative new dual camera system. I just spent a few days with HTC’s new flagship and this is probably the best Android smartphone I’ve laid my hands on. And it’s coming soon to Best Buy!

What is all the fuss about Spritz? If you were using a Spritz-enabled app, you would already have read to the end of this post and could tell us. But given that Spritz-enabled tech isn’t out there yet (it’s coming soon, though), here’s the scoop. Spritz is new speed reading technology that’s based on the theory that much of our time spent reading is wasted as our eyes move side to side. Display a word in one place, flash one word at a time and suddenly reading becomes much more efficient. Not only that, but by displaying just one word at a time, reading is suddenly possible on compact displays, like a smartphone or smartwatch. Being able to quickly (and painlessly) read e-mail, reports or even books on your Gear2 or Gear Neo suddenly makes the idea of wearable technology even more appealing.