Robotics

ZDNETKindle devices appeal to many people. When everything works, they’re great. But Amazon is becoming more and more finicky, both in terms of supported formats and the freedom to manage your own books.Kindle books use their own formats, most of the time with embedded DRM. However, there are oh-so-many ebooks available online, both for purchase and for free, that are not specifically tied to the Kindle ecosystem and your Amazon account. Also: Want free ebooks? These 10 sites offer thousands of optionsCalibre is an open-source ebook management and editing program. In this article, we’re going to use Calibre to go beyond the Kindle format for our ebooks on Kindle. Install Calibre To get started, point your browser to the Calibre download page and download the version for your computer. I’ll be using the Mac version from now on. Once installed, there are a few simple, if confusing, steps necessary to get started with Calibre. First, launch the application. You’ll see a setup screen like this. More

Yagi Studio/Getty Images Smartphone sales will grow in fits and starts, while tablet demand will wane. Large language models (LLMs) will boom, and demand for data management solutions will soar. Also: Crawl, then walk, before you run with AI agents, experts recommend These technologies will be “hot” — or “not” — over the coming five years, […] More

<!–> ZDNET’s key takeaways Lenovo’s 10th-Gen Yoga Slim 9i retails for $1,760. It’s a lightweight laptop with a striking design and an even more striking 4K OLED touchscreen. However, some will find its lack of ports limiting and the webcam low-quality. more buying choices One of the things I appreciate about Lenovo is its willingness […] More

Matthew Miller/ZDNETThe Pixel Watch 3 is getting a first-of-its-kind, potentially life-saving feature. In a blog post, Google announced that it had received FDA clearance for its Loss of Pulse Detection feature.Also: My new favorite Android smartwatch outperforms Google and Samsung in a crucial wayThe feature works by tracking your heartbeat. If your heart stops beating — due to cardiac arrest, respiratory or circulatory failure, overdose, or poisoning — your watch will automatically turn on more accurate infrared LEDs and look for motion data. If the watch determines you’re not responsive, it will start a countdown and audio alarm. If you still don’t respond, the watch will place a call to emergency services using your LTE or phone connection, inform them that you don’t have a pulse, and share your location. More

<!–> ZDNET’s key takeaways The Canon EOS R100 mirrorless camera is a great starter for aspiring photographers. It features a 24-megapixel sensor for great image quality and color and can capture 4K (UHD) video at 24 frames per second. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have a flip-out preview screen. more buying choices You can buy the Canon […] More

This package debuted in January as a beta, with a tempting discount for early subscribers. With today’s announcement, the beta label goes away, and so does the discount. For $70 a month, you get 25 channels, including MLB TV, the NFL and NBA and Golf channels, all the ESPN variants and ESPN+, TNT, TBS, and both Fox Sports channels, along with a handful of other sports networks. Also: Why I still recommend this Sony 4K TV over the cheaper Hisense and TCL modelsThe lineup also includes all of the big cable news networks (CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, and CNBC) and, depending on your market, local network affiliates from ABC/NBC/FOX/CW. It’s the most expensive of the new bundles, but it’s a relative bargain for diehard sports fans.For an additional $13 a month, you can add the five channels in the MySports Extra mini pack, which includes the NFL RedZone and Motor Trend channels. More

John W. Banagan/Getty Images Since the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in 2022, artificial intelligence (AI) technologies have become increasingly entrenched in our daily lives. However, a new study suggests that the American workforce seems largely uninterested in adopting AI en masse.  According to a Pew Research study released this week, around 80% of Americans don’t […] More

OpenAI Earlier this month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman shared a roadmap for its upcoming models, GPT-4.5 and GPT-5. In the X post, Altman shared that GPT-4.5, codenamed Orion internally, would be its last non-chain-of-thought model. Other than that, the details of the model remained a mystery — until today.  GPT-4.5 has launched On Thursday morning, […] More