Nintendo dropped a little Monday surprise today with the announcement of the SNES Classic. Retro gaming fans undoubtedly remember the buzz of the release and sales rush of the NES Classic last year, and many are still upset by that model’s unexpected discontinuation less than six months later—leaving many hopeful fans unable to grab the uber-popular device. This time around, Nintendo has promised better availability, so hopefully there will be plenty of SNES Classics to go around come holiday season.
Summer is here, and for those of us lucky enough to live in close proximity to a body of water with sandy shores, that means one thing: it’s time to hit the beach! In addition to sunscreen and a swimsuit, here are our picks for the products that will make your summer day on the water a little more fun.
YETI Hopper Portable Cooler
The cooler is an essential component of any beach or outdoor party kit. But it’s time to leave behind the cumbersome, boxy coolers of the past and opt for something a little easier to lug around, like the soft-sided Yeti Hopper. Part cooler and part duffel bag, the Yeti Hopper Two 20 offers the brand’s same legendary cold-keeping capabilities, in a flexible package that you can throw over a shoulder. It holds 18 cans of your favorite beverage (plus ice to keep them cool) or twenty pounds of ice. And don’t let that cushiness deceive you—the Yeti Hopper is still leakproof and extremely rugged. (more…)
Early last year, a savvy startup set out to solve a problem that plagued households across the country: home wireless networks with poor coverage. The average users expects WiFi in all areas of their home, and why wouldn’t they? We’ve all got a multitude of devices that require an internet connection: the laptop in the bedroom, the smart TV in the den, and the smartphone everywhere in between, from the front door to the bathroom. But that reliable coverage was hard to achieve. A typical wireless router might have stellar bandwidth at close range, but when you turn a corner, go upstairs, or close a couple of doors, your wireless signal may drop significantly.
Eero solved this problem by reinventing the way home wireless systems are propogated, using multiple points of network access instead of just a single router. The resulting mesh network blankets your entire home with full coverage, meaning that even in the nooks and crannies of your home, on a floor above or below your modem, you’ll have no problem tuning in an excellent wi-fi signal. We took a look at the Eero here:
Today, Eero released their second generation wireless system, improving upon the original by making it more powerful and even easier to use. Though outward appearance remains unchanged, the Eero wireless base stations have been upgraded with much-improved internals. A new antenna array and the addition of tri-band support give the new Eero twice the bandwidth and double the range of the original, letting your Eero network support more users while giving faster speeds with farther signal penetration. (more…)
A Wine Refrigerator is a must for the serious wine enthusiast. Not only can fine wine be a significant investment, it requires care and attention to some basic details: the three most important factors to consider in wine storage are temperature, light, and humidity. So celebrate #NationalWineDay with us and learn some useful facts while you’re at it. Alright, let’s get started!
Two of the best things about summer in Chicago are baseball and cooking outdoors, and this portable grill from Weber brings them together. Equally at home on your balcony or a party on the beach, the Weber Q 1200 is easily portable, yet can quickly cook up a dozen burgers. Plus, it’s emblazoned with the logo of our hometown heroes, the Chicago Cubs. But best of all, it’s yours to win. Click through the image or the link below to enter for your chance to win!
Since the beginning of the flat-screen TV era, manufacturers have been slowly marching towards creating the “perfect” TV. Plasma TVs produced a phenomenal picture, but their glass screens were susceptible to bad glare and the technology was an energy hog, plus the TVs were still quite heavy. LCD TVs—and then LED TVs—were much more energy-efficient and could be made significantly lighter and thinner than plasma displays, but they never quite measured up in picture quality. Whichever technology a user opted for, there was a compromise to be made, until now. OLED TVs check every box on the list of traits you’d ever want on a TV: nearly infinite contrast ratio, vibrant colors, 4K resolution, extreme energy efficiency, and an ultra-thin construction.
OLED TVs were, for many years, something of a technological holy grail. They’ve existed as prototypes for years, and were often dismissed as vaporware. But now that two of the biggest names in television have multiple models of OLED TVs for sale, it’s safe to say that the technology has officially arrived. Both the LG Signature OLED TV and Sony A1E OLED TVs are available at Abt, so we unboxed one of each and compared the two. If you’re in the market to buy an OLED TV, this is the comparison you need to see:
Earlier this week, we talked about some of the technologies and practices that Abt has implemented in our business which help us be green on a day-to-day basis. And while it might not be feasible for individual homeowners to cover their roof in solar panels, there are still plenty of tactics that each of us can practice to help 2ease our impact on the environment. We’ve all heard of the 3 R’s of being environmentally-friendly: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle. These are some of the simplest ways we can work to better the environment, so here are some ways each of us can fit the 3 R’s into our daily lives.
Recycle
Most of us live in cities with municipal recycling programs. We take our cans, plastic bottles and paper products and drop them in a bin at the end of our driveway every week, and they’re hauled away and recycled, which keeps about 89 million tons of waste out of landfills. But it’s not always as easy to recycle other, larger items—your TV, cell phones, old light bulbs—which can be toxic to the earth.
In 2010, around 2.4 million tons of electronic waste was disposed of, with only 27% of it being properly recycled. Products that end up in landfills will eventually release hazardous substances like mercury, lead, and PCBs into the ground, which can contaminate our crops and water sources. In an era when we’re all constantly upgrading our gadgets, it’s increasingly important that our old devices get recycled properly. Thankfully, there are centers across the country that make it easy to drop off your old e-waste for safe recycling. Can’t make it out to Abt to recycle your old appliances, electronics, or other devices? Visit RecycleNation to search for your nearest recycling facility. Their recycling finder is also a great way to discover all of the other items you can recycle, including things you may never have thought of.
April showers can lead to more than just May flowers if you like to be active outdoors in the spring. You might not mind a little sprinkle on your morning run or weekend in the park, but your electronics probably will. A typical phone, wireless speaker or camera can usually survive a brief encounter with water, but when you’re unsure what the weather’s going to bring, it’s better to be safe than sorry. Luckily, there are more options than ever for ensuring your electronics can endure extensive exposure to nature’s wrath. Here are five of our favorite water-resistant products for your spring adventures.
Smartphone
Your smartphone is your hub to any and all digital activities, from entertainment to productivity. If it gets soaked by a surprise shower or a dip in a puddle, you may suddenly find yourself without your music collection, workout tracking, communications and more. If you’ll be springing for a new smartphone this spring, consider choosing a waterproof model like the Samsung Galaxy S7. This high-end smartphone packs all of the great features you’d expect from a Samsung flagship smartphone (a quad-core processor, QHD AMOLED display, expandable storage, 4K video, and more) all wrapped in a resilient package. So not only do you get IP68 rating for dust and water-resistance—meaning the S7 can survive a dunk in up to 5 feet of water for up to 30 minutes—but you don’t have to sacrifice performance to get it. (more…)
They say time flies when you’re having fun, which might be why it’s hard to believe that it’s been a full year since we first got to play with the HTC Vive virtual reality system. The Vive has been one of our favorite gadgets to come out in the last year. To mark its one-year anniversary, HTC has designated April 5th “Vive Day,” and will be celebrating with a variety of offers for new customers who pick up a Vive system on that day.
Let’s be honest. No matter where you go on vacation, every possible photo op has been done to death. If you’re looking to set yourself apart from the crowd creatively, you’re going to need to include some new tactics into your repertoire. Here are seven ways to set your social media game on fire during your next vacation.
1.) Elevate your photography, literally.
One way to set your vacation photos apart from the crowd is to take to the skies with a drone. Drone photography will open up an entirely new way to see the sights of your destination, and also make for a pretty unique selfie opportunity. The current generation of drones is easier than ever to fly, so with minimal practice, you can be adding some killer aerial shots to your vacation feed. Take a look at how using a drone captured a much more dramatic view of our rooftop solar panels:
Using a drone can take your vacation photos to new heights.
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