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Kitchen conversations usually consist of "what time is dinner ready?" and "it's your turn to load the dishwasher," but Amazon's Alexa-powered microwave hopes to change all that. It's easy to joke at the idea of a voice-controlled appliance, certainly one which counts proactively reordering popcorn among its key talents, but the AmazonBasics Microwave is more important than you might think. For $60, it's Amazon's cunning Trojan horse for Alexa.

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Google seems to be pushing Chrome OS as the one platform to rule them all. Samsung now seems to be singing a slightly different tune, but one that, unsurprisingly requires buying and playing its instruments. After promising and teasing it last year, Samsung has finally started the beta of its Linux on DeX experience to the interested few that own a Galaxy Note 9 or a Galaxy Tab S4. Even while still in beta form, the experience is already impressive and can really let you get almost anything accomplished just using your phone with one important and very obvious caveat. You have to be comfortable using Linux.

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At long last, Samsung has finally revealed a working prototype of its much-hyped foldable phone. But while it finally gives some sense of closure to years of speculation and leaks, reception and fuss over what could be the market's second foldable phone has been less enthusiastic than expected. And it's not because someone got there first. Because while Samsung has indeed proven that a truly foldable phone is not only possible but also coming soon next year, its presentation failed to address the biggest question that consumers will have in their mind: "what for?"

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If the rumors and teasing is true, Samsung is about to show us its long-anticipated foldable smartphone. Variously known as the Galaxy X or, more recently, the Galaxy F, the folding phone is expected to make its debut - or at least get a preview - at Samsung's Developer Conference on Wednesday in San Francisco, CA. The question is, has Samsung got more than a hardware showcase for us?

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It was an interesting weekend for Blizzard, its fans, and the Diablo series. On Friday, Blizzard revealed Diablo Immortal, a new game set between Diablo 2 and Diablo 3 that'll be available exclusively on iOS and Android. Fans, in short, weren't pleased by this announcement, and the blowback began almost immediately, with one BlizzCon attendee now-famously asking during a panel that took place almost immediately following the announcement if Immortal was some kind of "out-of-season April Fools joke."

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Android tablets are dead. The nail in the coffin was the Google Pixel Slate, not the first Chrome OS tablet but the most notable. With Chrome OS able to run Android apps and now sporting tablet-like form factors, there’s practically no reason to have Android tablets anymore, unless you’re talking about cheap Android tablets from less known brands. That may be fine, considering how Android is notoriously bad at tablet form factors. But despite that, Google’s mobile platform still needs to have tablet-friendly apps if they are to survive a Chrome OS future.

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Creatives have a shiny new iPad Pro, while MacBook Air die-hards have an all-new Retina model, but where does that leave the 12-inch MacBook? Apple's thinnest, lightest laptop has been controversial from day one, its single USB-C port and low-profile keyboard forcing some not-insignificant compromises in return for its extreme portability.

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Days before its big Pixel event, Google released its latest version of its wearable spin on Android. Not Android Wear, of course, but Wear OS, this time version 2.0. The release was met with generally positive response, praising the more streamlined UI that finally makes it more convenient to use navigate through the smartwatch. It didn’t take long, however, for the initial excitement over Wear OS 2.0 to die down, for one reason or another. It is, unfortunately, indicative of the problem that threatens to ultimately make Android smartwatches obsolete and irrelevant.

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Apple tested its strategy out on the iPhone, took a risk, and it paid off: now, it’s the turn of the Mac - and specifically the new MacBook Air - to go next. For long-time MacBook Air fans, the late-2018 update to the ultraportable addressed a lot of complaints. Faster processors, more storage, and a Retina display all checked off boxes long-overdue. However there was one change we were hoping not to see.

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The arrival of foldable phones are inevitable. The question now is less of when but in what form. There might be some that would look like the hip grandchilren of flip phones. Arguably, the more interesting ones will be the phones that fold into a tablet and back again. There is still some doubt as to whether that will just be a passing fad, just like notches or phablets. Foldable tablet-phones might actually be the only way forward given today’s smartphone usage trend. And Samsung might very well be the only one in that position to blaze a trail and prove what that future holds.

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Since time immemorial, OK maybe just a decade or so ago, people have imagined what a Google OS would be like. At one point, it seemed that would be something based on Ubuntu Linux which turned out to simply be a version they use internally. Then came Android, which almost because but still isn’t that Google OS. These days, the running theory is Fuchsia OS but you don’t have to go that far into the future. That Google OS might already be already be here in the form of Chrome OS but it’s still missing one important thing to truly establish it as more than just a passing but expensive experiment for Google.

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Electrification is in fashion now, but there’s still plenty of room for EVs to catch up with their gas-burning brethren. While Tesla may have led the charge in electric luxury, while Nissan, Chevrolet, and others have focused on the entry-level, the pickings are still rich for vehicles taking advantage of electric motors’ instantaneous torque, zero emissions, and design flexibility.

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