Hello friends! you are welcome installer Number 103, your guide to the best and the verge-The best stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, sorry everything’s so expensive this week, and you can also read all the older editions here installer home page.)
This week, I’m reading about hooliganism And costco And protein bar And Jonas Brothersbinge no one wants this Season two, trying to figure out how to save $4,500 New Rivian e-biketelling anyone who will listen t-pain still got iti can learn all about it louvre robberyplaying a surprising amount Fortnite On my iPad, and for shopping yoto player About a dozen of you told me I should do this. Thanks for that.
I’ve got a cool new e-reader for you, a new AI browser, a new version of a favorite old game, and much more.
Too, Keep sending me your favorite endless rewatchesI’ve already received so many responses that I think next week’s issue might be dedicated entirely to this topic… Shows, movies, TikToks, creators, all the things you watch over and over, keep sending!
(As always, the best part of installer Have your thoughts and suggestions. What are you reading/watching/playing/printing/patching up with duct tape this week? Tell me everything: installer@theverge.com. And if you know anyone else who might enjoy installerForward this to them and ask them to subscribe here.)
- boox palma 2 pro, There is no limit to my love for this smartphone-sized e-reader. (Okay, some limitations, but not too many.) This new model is fascinating: It has a color screen, cell connection, pen input…it’s almost a phone? At $399, the price is headed in the wrong direction, but I’m deeply curious about this thing.
- chatgpt atlas, AI browsers are a dime a dozen. This is Chrome with a chatbot everywhere you look! But given the sheer size of ChatGPT, it matters anyway; If anyone can make a real dent in the browser market right now, it’s OpenAI.
- Plants vs. Zombies: Replanted, Good news: pvz is back! The bad news: It doesn’t look like anyone tried too hard with this reboot. I think the result is this: I have played it many times already and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.
- samsung galaxy xr, It’s the Vision Pro, but lighter and more comfortable and at half the price. I’m not that excited about the headset as a genre yet, but it’s still a pretty good sales pitch! As an entertainment device, Samsung may have something here.
- aura ink, This is the Samsung Frame TV of digital picture frames: a 13.5-inch E Ink panel that hangs on your wall and apparently needs charging every few months. Nice idea, and I know everyone who has Aura frames loves them, but the $499 price tag is hard to swallow.
- bloom, I’ve been experimenting with a bunch of Mac apps that make navigating the entire system a little easier – tabtab A recent favorite – and I really like this app’s improvements to Finder. It’s worth it for the file-naming and image-resizing tools alone.
- a house of dynamite, “The premise is perhaps a little more realistic?” Another files for, but everything I’m hearing about Kathryn Bigelow’s new Brink of War Netflix thriller suggests it’s about as entertaining as you’d hope. It’s first on my watch list this weekend.
- Fujifilm X-T30 III, Bringing you new cameras this week, including from Leica and Lomography! But I’m a fan of Fujifilm’s
- glamping, A Tubi original film directed and starring the winner of a platform-wide contest for new creators. It’s a horror movie about influencers, the trailer seems either legit-good or damn-good, and I love a campy horror movie. I’m weirdly excited about this.
john higgins I’ve forgotten more about TV than I ever knew. It’s only been a few weeks into his tenure as Senior Reviewer for TV & Audio, and he’s already blown my mind with his knowledge and his credentials – including the fact that he’s a certified TV calibrator, which is now instantly my new goal in life.
Anyway, you’ll see John everywhere The Verge Covering all types of audio and video gear. I asked him to share his homescreen, because I like to show it to new people and see if he understands the phone well and I can feel a slight superiority over him. Sorry, no dice.
Here’s John’s homescreen, along with some information about the apps he uses and why:
phone: I’m currently on the iPhone 15 Pro Max, but considering upgrading to the 17.
Wallpaper: This is a photo of a redwood as I drove up the west coast from Los Angeles to a little north of Seattle in 2023. I spent a few days camping among the redwoods, hiking, and being absolutely amazed by the nature of Andor… I mean, Northern California.
Apps: Wallet, Settings, Camera, Apple Maps, FaceTime, Reminders, Apple Notes, Chrome, Safari, Weather, Find My, Photos, SoCal Sound, Phone, Messages, Mail, Calendar.
I’m very bad at organizing my apps (although I did use this opportunity to clean them up a bit). I usually download them and show them at the end of my list. Right now I have six screens of apps, including a ton of AV apps for each manufacturer.
My main screen contains the things I access most often: email, various social networking (like Instagram, Signal, WhatsApp, LinkedIn), my home app for device control, loads of streaming apps, and of course the games I play the most. Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes (which I’ve been playing since it launched about 10 years ago) and marvel strike force,
I also asked John to share some of the things he’s currently involved in. Here’s what he sent back:
- Right now, my son has really started to get into it star wars (Finally!), so we’re watching movies and about to start clone wars,
- I also recently started following an interesting Instagram creator, dave chisholmJoe is a comic book artist and musician who analyzes the great musical canon of Radiohead songs with his illustrations. I majored in musical performance, so I really understand the way he breaks down song structure and musical symbolism with ease.
- I am also very big drop out fans, and I’m glad that the new season make some noise just started.
what’s here installer Community is in this week. I also want to know what you are doing right now! email installer@theverge.com Or message me on Signal – @davidpierce.11 – with your recommendations for anything and everything, and we’ll feature some of our favorites here every week. For more great recommendations, check out these answers This post on threads And This post on BlueSky,
“After setting up my NAS a few weeks ago, I moved away from Google Photos imichA self-hosted duplicate that is almost identical. The process of transferring photos was a pain, but now I have my own image server. I have started working on the setting house assistantAnd my journey of self hosting (as much as I can) is well and truly underway. – Craig
“End Work Today on HBO. Incredibly well done, completely devastating in parts and uplifting in others.” -Oli
“I recently discovered a use case that, in my opinion, fully justifies its existence: loading board game instructions notebooklm And to use it as a guide and, more importantly, as a judge during debates. -Jacob
“Just finished reading notification This Morning by Cory Doctorow. Very good read, and I would highly recommend.” – Nathaniel
“Just got this Reku Charger Dock To add some functionality to my Mac Mini M4. Waiting for an NVMe SSD to add storage to my Mac.” – Jean-François
“enjoying myself md vinylThis is a great looking app that focuses on albums. These apps are a dime a dozen, but this one often keeps my phone on standby. -Matthew
,ball x pit Like it’s taken over my life Balatro Did at one time.” -Ronak
,zen browser “Recently received a great update that has greatly improved the quality of life and in general it has become my go-to daily browser over the past few months.” – Jenego
“I really enjoy racing small cars on some serious tracks. 3dbotmaker There’s a YouTube channel where they do some amazing racing, and they’re in the middle of DRC-X right now. It’s beautifully filmed, has some great commentary, and it’s all about the big air, baby.” -Jasper
I’m in eternal battle with what I call “scrolling apps” on my phone. I’ll delete Reddit and threads and Bluesky and Instagram and everything else, then find myself stuck in line at Costco and suddenly, worst of all, they’ll all reappear. Reading is definitely good, and I like doing crosswords, but sometimes I feel like want To look at my phone for 10 minutes, you know?
The best thing I’ve found, somewhat surprisingly, is drop out(I wrote this earlier after John told me he also liked Dropout, I swear.) I recently became a subscriber, and its huge library of comedy games with good vibes has become the perfect thing to watch for a few minutes at a time. (Sam Reich, if you’re reading this: give me a vertical video feed of all your social clips in the app!) Loading One make some noise The episode leaves me in a much better mood than Doomscrolling, and like the rest of the Internet, I’m rapidly turning into one. Brennan Lee Mulligan Superfan. Highly recommended in all cases.
