Euro Fishing is giving you the ticket to escape with Waldsee, which takes anglers deep into Germany’s thick forests. Out tomorrow (9th Jan) for Xbox One and PS4 and PC.
Waldsee, which means ‘forest lake’ in German, lives up to its name as it transports Euro Fishing players to a hidden hideaway surrounded by dense woodland and sun-kissed rocks. In fact, Waldsee is such a well-kept secret that even its exact stock of fish remains a mystery. You’ll get to explore these uncharted waters for yourself, with all sorts of surprises awaiting skilled anglers. Early visitors have fished carp up to 62lbs and catfish up to 68lbs. Can you break those records?
“Waldsee will offer a brand-new experience for Euro Fishing fans,” said Mark Greenway, Fishing Business Director at Dovetail Games, “It has amazing fish and scenic views while also remaining a secret to the fishing community at large. It’s the type of fishing spot that’s harder and harder to find nowadays and we wanted to somewhere that takes you away from the real world, giving you an intimate and personal environment where you can fish at your own pace.”
Waldsee is the fourth DLC release for Euro Fishing, following Foundry Dock, Manor Farm and L’ac Dor. Waldsee has over 600 fish stocked in its lake and 20 new boss fish to catch, with 10 new trophies on offer for skilled fishermen.
“Breath-taking audio from a single box integrated amplifier. Compact, yet boasting an incredible audio specification. Send Bluetooth from your phone, directly connect a record player, or plug in Google’s Chromecast audio for CD quality streamed music. It also has sound for pound, one of the best headphone amplifiers money can buy. ONE is the standard by which others are measured.”
We gave the Cyrus One, along with it’s current three month free trial to TIDAL our Gold Award in our review – it’s that good!
How to enter to win
We have the Cyrus One Stereo Amplifier along with a pair of speakers from Wharfdale for a prize package worth £1000! to give away!
With the magical release of the Trolls Christmas Special recently, featuring Anna Kendrick and Justin Timberlake, Hasbro have released the Trolls POD’ular Tree playset and the Hair in the Air Poppy doll.
DreamWorks Trolls Hair in the Air Poppy
Put your hair in the air and light up the party! DreamWorks Trolls Poppy is the heroic leader, lifting the spirits of everyone around her with positivity and the belief that, with a song in your heart, you can do anything! Get her ready for the big celebration and delight in the light from her hair with the DreamWorks Trolls Hair in the Air Poppy doll. Press her gown’s button to see her light up with sound effects. Then, brush Poppy’s hair with the included comb to set off the twinkling lights in the pattern of the brushing. Her soft, pink hair is 14 inches long and bendable, so kids can twist, bend, and create lots of hairstyles. Complete her look with her tiara headband to crown her as queen!
Includes doll, headband, and comb.
• Bend the doll’s plush hair into different styles
• Her signature pink hair is 14-inches long
• Style and brush her hair to activate lights and sounds
• Unlock a song with special styling pattern
DreamWorks Trolls Hair in the Air Poppy is available now priced around £34.99.
DreamWorks Trolls POD’ular Troll Tree
Welcome to the vibrant town of the DreamWorks Trolls, where a song can lift anyone up, and it’s encouraged to let your true colors shine! Kids can build and explore their own version of this magical village with the DreamWorks Trolls POD’ular Troll Tree! It’s over 16 inches tall for tons of trolltastic fun. Customize the tree’s look by rearranging the movable pods. There are 4 different hanging pods, including 1 with a lounge area for the DreamWorks Trolls Poppy figure. Send Poppy and her friends (additional figures sold separately) zooming from the top to bottom by clipping their hair to the zipline. That’s not the only way down — the tree also has a slide for getting down in a hurry. Pretend the Bergens are near – kids can help Trolls seek refuge in the tree’s hiding places. With so many ways to play, it’s a hair raising good time!
Includes playset, figure, 4 pods, 3 mushrooms, bug clip, zip line, tiara, and instructions and is aimed at kids aged 4 and up.
DreamWorks Trolls POD’ular Troll Tree is available now priced around £39.99.
The Honor View 10 (£449.99) which is available to pre-order and starting to ship today (5th January 2018), the Honor View 10 uses a Kirin 970 octa-core processor that also includes an NPU, Neural Processing Unit.
This NPU handles the AI (Artificial Intelligence). And this AI is what makes the View 10 the most advanced handset of 2018 (for now), this is just the beginning of what smartphones will do in the future.
The overall performance of the Honor View 10 is impressive, with more OTA updates later in this review to add more options for this phone. This handset comes with dual cameras on the rear and it does an excellent job, check the camera section for more on that. Fast Charging is supported and battery life is decent enough.
Honor View 10 Specs and more
What’s Inside the box (Unboxing the Honor View 10) : Handset, user guide, data cable (USB to USB Type C), SIM ejector PIN and fast charger 9V/2A
Body : Metal body, excellent build and finishing, curvy design, camera module on the back is slightly out. Handset is comfortable to hold and use SIM Type : Nano + Nano / Micro SD Screen : 5.99 inches, 2160 x 1080 pixels resolution (Full HD+), viewing angles, touch response and colour reproduction are very good Weight and thickness : 172 grams, 7mm thick Connectivity : 4G, VoLTE, WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth Sensors : Accelerometer, Proximity, Gyro, Light, step, hall and Magnetic sensor Security and Extra : Finger Print sensor, face unlock LED Notification : Yes OTG : Yes supported RAM : 6GB ROM : 128GB (about 108GB free on first boot) OS : EMUI 8.0 based on Android Oreo 8.0.0
Design
The Honor View 10 is a beautifully designed phone. Honor has always had a penchant for designing phones that look understated, sleek and classy. Be it the stellar Honor 8 and 8 Pro, Honor smartphones have always stood out in terms of design.
The View 10 is also cut out from the same mould with it’s looks quite sophisticated and charming. It is a very well made smartphone that does not resort to tacky and gaudy finishes in a bid to stand out from the crowd.
The matte metal back with its cleverly integrated antenna lines (along with the top and bottom edges) looks quite elegant. The curved edges and rounded corners help mask the bulk of the smartphone to an extent but one-handed usability is still a pipe dream. Inspite of having a hefty 3,750mAh battery on board, the View 10 is surprisingly thin (6.76mm) and light.
The build quality is also top-notch – the buttons feels nice and meaty and the View 10 feels like it can take a drop or two in its stride.
The front fascia of the View 10 is fairly unique. In order to accommodate the edge-to-edge display, most bezel-less smartphones have had to shift the fingerprint sensor to the back or get rid of it entirely.
The Honor View 10’s fingerprint sensor, however, is located underneath the display. Not only is the fingerprint sensor, which is cleverly embedded underneath the glass surface, quite fast and accurate but its position makes it much easier to use than its rear-mounted equivalents.
The View 10’s 5.99-inch LCD panel has an aspect ratio of 18:9 and a resolution of 2160×1080 (FullHD+). Simply put, the Honor V10’s display is excellent and one of the highlights of the smartphone. With the Viewing angles are excellent (one of the best in the price range), colours are bright and punchy, the colour temperature is spot on and brightness levels are adequate.
A QuadHD display would have been icing on the cake but the lack of pixels is not really felt in daily use.
Honor View 10 and the aspect that sets it apart from the host of upper mid-range smartphones out there is the future forward processor nestled deep within its chassis.
The Kirin 970 is the first processor that is designed from the ground up for AI. The Neural Processing Unit (NPU) inside the 970 enables AI features to occur locally, instead of over the cloud.
The Kirin 970 chipset was first introduced in Huawei’s Mate 10 and Mate 10 Pro flagships and has now trickled down the price range. The Kirin 970 chipset is not only blazingly fast but comes with a dedicated Neural Processing Unit (NPU) that pumps artificial intelligence infused power through the Honor View 10’s veins.
Almost every aspect of the Honor View 10 – from the camera to the software has been given a dose of artificial intelligence love. EMUI 8.0, which runs on Android 8.0 Oreo uses machines learning to understand and anticipate user behaviour. It allocates resources to those apps you use the most to make sure the View 10 runs ‘smoothly even after months of use’.
All this is not just marketing fluff. EMUI 8 is a huge step up from previous iterations – it is fast, fluid and butter smooth. Animations are snappy and navigation is quick and frustration-free. Honor has done quite a commendable job of streamlining and speeding up EMUI. Saying that there is still quite a long way to go.
The Honor View 10 is blazingly fast – I am talking about flagship-level performance here.
With the View 10 handles everything from simple day use to intensive workloads with aplomb. During the two weeks I used the smartphone as my daily driver over the Christmas break, I experienced next to no lags and hiccups. Thanks to the 6GB of RAM on board, RAM management on the View 10 is efficient and even when a lot of apps are running in the background, a minimized app is not killed.
Gaming on the phone is also quite a pleasurable experience. Not only is the 18:9 display perfect for long gaming sessions, but performance is also butter smooth. Games do not utilize the entire grunt of the Kirin 970 chipset by default. It is only when you turn on the gaming mode inside Honor’s Game Suite that graphics intensive games like Asphalt 8 unlock the Kirin 970’s potential. Once they do though, they run at highest settings and with all animations and transitions running smooth and flawlessly.
AI features
The Honor View 10 has a few nifty tricks up its sleeve – some of which are helped along by artificial intelligence. You can answer and place calls with your voice and find your phone by simply saying “where are you”?
Honor has also followed in the footsteps of the iPhone X and OnePlus 5T and equipped the View 10 with facial recognition skills. Oddly enough, the facial recognition cannot be used to unlock the smartphone as of now (the feature is supposedly coming soon via a software update). What you can do currently is prevent nosy friends and family members from reading lock screen notifications by enabling facial recognition lock.
As mentioned above, EMUI 8.0 also uses machine learning to understand and anticipate user behaviour and speed up the software. While it is hard to empirically gauge how much benefit this brings to the table, the speed and fluidity of EMUI 8.0 are quite noticeable.
Honor has also tied up with Microsoft for an AI accelerated translator. Honor claims the application uses the Kirin 970’s AI capabilities to offer near-instant translations in 50 languages., the app’s text translation feature worked like a charm.
An area where artificial intelligence really makes a difference is the camera. Thanks to the NPU, the Honor View 10 intelligently detects the object or scene you are clicking and optimizes image settings accordingly. Honor says the View 10 can detect 13 different types of scenes and objects – including dogs, cats, plants and printed text. Far from being a gimmick, this really makes a difference to image quality. The front camera also uses AI for background blurring as well.
For unlocking, the phone will prompt you to use the fingerprint scanner. This Facial ID is also supposedly driven by AI and the company also plans to add something similar to Animoji on the iPhoneX both will be added via an Over the Air update in the future to add these options for the Honor View 10.
Battery Life
Honor has done a great job squeezing as much juice as possible from the Honor View 10’s 3,750mAh battery pack. With moderate to intensive use involving Google Maps, photography, YouTube binge sessions and heavy browsing and also using emails and Twitter and Facebook, I struggled to drain more than 50 to 60 percent of the battery in a single day. But with moderate use, the phone will easily last 1.5 days on a single charge.
For one day I decided to keep using the smartphone till it eventually died. The smartphone finally gave up the ghost after 19 hours of usage and a fairly impressive 6 and a half hours of screen time.
Camera with extra AI
The Honor View 10 comes with a dual camera setup at the back – a 16MP primary RGB (colour) sensor paired with a 20MP monochrome (black and white) sensor. Both sensors have an aperture of f/1.8 and are accompanied by an LED flash. On the front, the View 10 comes with a single 13MP camera capable of shooting bokeh shots via software algorithms.F
The Honor View 10’s rear camera setup is set to be the segment benchmark for the foreseeable future. Images are sharp, detailed, well exposed and even capable of giving more expensive smartphones a run for their money.
As mentioned above, what truly makes the Honor View 10’s rear camera special is its ability to detect what you are clicking (or how you are framing the image) and optimise image settings accordingly. During the two weeks I used the View 10 as my daily driver, it recognized dogs and cats, plants, human faces, macros and even printed text with ease.
The results are surprisingly good as the detection process really improves the colour, light and shadows and hue of the photo. Basically, it gives you a photo you wouldn’t want (and need) to edit. In low light as well, the View 10’s rear camera impresses. The monochrome+RGB combination works wonders to capture a lot of detail in low light. Noise, while prevalent, is contained and low-light shots, in general, are crisp and detailed.
monochromemonochrome with digital zoom
The monochrome sensor can also be used to take some striking black and white shots. When the light is adequate, monochrome shots have excellent detail and dynamic range through the quality does dip when the sun goes down.
Just like any dual camera smartphone out there, the Honor View 10 can be used to take bokeh shots. The bokeh mode, while much improved from the Honor 8 Pro is the least impressive aspect of the rear camera.
At medium settings, it keeps clear outlines and brings out a good background blur effect. But at full settings, there is partial blurring at some places and a halo around the objects is visible, I hope this can be fixed with updates very soon.
Picture of a few snowflakes coming down over Christmas 2017with HDR onJust using candle for light source for this picture
HDR
The front camera of the Honor View 10 is nowhere near as impressive as the rear setup. While bokeh shots are decent, images can be a little soft and be lacking in detail at times. In low light, the 13MP sensor struggles quite a bit and produces images with a lot of noise and graininess.
Verdict
I really like what Honor has done with the View 10
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has just announced the characters in Champions, the next downloadable Character Pack for LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2.
The upcoming pack, priced at £1.69 on PlayStation 4 and £1.59 on Xbox One, will add characters from Marvel Comics’ popular Champions comic book series, offering players the chance to unleash the limitless strength of Amadeus Cho and supersonic flight of Nova.
The pack also includes Ironheart, Devil Dinosaur, Moon Girl, Viv, Wasp (Nadia Pym), and Hawkeye (Kate Bishop), expanding the main game’s roster of over 200 Super Heroes and Super Villains.
The Champions are a group of teenage Super Heroes started by three Avengers disillusioned by the behaviour of their elders and the general state of distrust by the people towards super-powered beings. Eager to show the world what it truly means to be a Super Hero, they formed their own team and soon recruited other teenagers with similar ideals to their cause. Together they are determined to change the world their own way!
LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2 is an all-new, epic adventure and sequel to the smash hit, LEGO , Marvel Super Heroes. This original branching storyline, co-written by award-winning comic book writer Kurt Busiek, transports players into a cosmic battle across a myriad of Marvel locations ripped from time and space and combined to form the incredible Open Hub World of Chronopolis. Packed with signature LEGO humour for fans of all ages, gamers will go head-to-head with the time-travelling Kang the Conqueror in this fun-filled journey spanning the Marvel Universe.
The Champions character pack can be purchased separately or as part of the Season Pass, which provides access to six Level Packs and four Character Packs, including the previously released Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 , and the Out of Time and Agents of Atlas Character Packs. The Season Pass is available for £11.99 or as part of the LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2 Deluxe Edition, which features the main game, access to the Classic Guardians of the Galaxy Character Pack, and an exclusive Giant-Man LEGO Minifigure (Minifigure only available in the physical version of the Deluxe Edition).
LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2 is available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC.
There are a lot of smart thermostats on the market and Hive is British Gas’ answer to Nest and others. But making a home a smart one can sound daunting but there can also be real financial benefits, especially where heating is involved but can it make your home smarter?
Hive promises to help in keeping energy bills down by allowing you to control the temperature of your home at a push of a button on your smartphone or the Hive Active Heating 2 and adjust accordingly.
It could be that you are on your way to work or out shopping and you have neglected to turn down the heating.
With the app, you can do just that and much more.
If you are buying new, Hive costs £249. This price includes the installation by a trained technician. That is the only price you have to pay, there are no ongoing costs and you don’t have to be a British Gas customer either.
The system is compatible with most boilers but you may need to check before installation to make sure your boiler works with Hive.
If you have one boiler, the installation will cover connecting to this and creating one heating zone. If you plan to separate your home into separate heating zones, then each additional zone will set you back £99 (This is known as Hive Multizone).
The system comes with three devices , One is a wireless controller that connects to the boiler.
The Hub sits between the thermostat and the internet so you can control it via an app. The hub and the controller need to be close enough to allow each to talk to the other. Otherwise, you will need a wireless booster to ensure good connectivity between the two.
Installation was quick and easy.
The hub connects to the wireless router and when plugged in, will indicate whether or not it has successfully connected to the cloud.
The hub and controller are very functional rather than stylish so hiding these away may seem like a good idea, but be careful that hiding them away also prevents adequate connectivity. The thermostat (which is a lot better looking) doesn’t need any cabling so can be placed anywhere.
Features and usage
The thermostat is very easy to use. Just press the button and it will tell you the current temperature and the target temperature. The dial in the middle of the device will allow you to turn the heating up or down.
There are also three other buttons (Menu, Done and Back). These will enable you to carry out other functions, such as setting a schedule.
A button on the top can be used to boost the temperature and you can decide how long you want the heating to stay on for, regardless of whether or not you’ve reached the right temperature.
The Hive app can also be used to control things and it is dead easy to use. It also features more ways to control heating. As well as this, the app can also be used to control other things around the house, such as lights and Hive Active Plugs (the review coming soon). These will also show up in the app.
Scheduling is best done via the app, you can specify when to heat your house and to what temperature.
You can also specify different schedules for different days of the week. Copying schedules between days of the week are easy too.
The app also sports a geo-location system which can work out if you have left home or are heading for it. It will then ask if you want to set the temperature lower or higher. There is also a holiday mode you can use to ensure that things tick over without using energy unnecessarily.
Smart home usage
As mentioned earlier, you can also control things other than heating with the app. Hive as a range of smart light bulbs, motion sensors and switches you can control with the app.
These are simple to install. Just plug them into wherever you need them to be and then head over to the app and click on the Install Devices section. The app will ask if you want to Add a Heating Zone or Add Another Device.
Add Another Device will search out for any devices you have plugged in. In our case, this took around a minute to complete. Devices have somewhat of a generic naming system but the app allows you to call them something more memorable.
There are also recipes that you can use to make devices operate in certain circumstances. For example, you can have a light switch on if the motion detector senses movement. Important if you need to deter burglars.
Hive also integrates with Alexa and Google Home which means you can control heating with your voice. Adding in a Hive account to Alexa/Google Home is pretty straightforward and within seconds we could literally tell Hive to switch the heating off.
Overall
Hive is a great way to turn a home into a smart one. You can add as many or as little smart devices to it as you please. Again I like to say a big thank you for Hive for supplying the Hive Active Heating for the review. Also, my Wife who is disabled can now change the temperature of the house with her voice via Google Home Mini “Ok Google change Heating to … temperature etc”.
Today Mad Catz made a surprise return to the international gaming scene.
Less than a year after the much-loved brand disappeared from the gaming landscape, Mad Catz is back: under new management, with new ideas, new attitude and most importantly, an entire range of new, high-quality gaming products!
Known for their award-winning range of R.A.T.™ gaming mice, arcade FightSticks, gaming headsets and much more besides, the new Mad Catz will focus first on quality, committed to producing innovative gaming products, designed and engineered in-house to stand out amongst the competition and deliver superlative performance for gamers of all abilities.
At CES 2018, Mad Catz will be previewing the first products in the new range, a line of all-new PC gaming hardware including new R.A.T. mice, S.T.R.I.K.E.™ keyboards, F.R.E.Q.™ gaming headsets and G.L.I.D.E.™ gaming surfaces.
Key products in the new range include the R.A.T.AIR™an-all new version of the iconic, fully-adjustable gaming mouse, now with a state-of-the-art wireless power system. The R.A.T.AIR requires no unreliable battery pack to operate, instead drawing power via the wireless activation gaming surface, included in pack. For gamers preferring to use their own gaming surface, the R.A.T.AIR also includes a robust USB cable in pack, instantly converting the R.A.T. to a wired mouse.
The S.T.R.I.K.E.4 gaming keyboard features a fully mechanical key bed, aluminium frame and RGB lighting, and theF.R.E.Q.4gaming headset utilizes high-quality 40mm neodymium drivers and a metal plated frame. Further details of new products in the range are expected to be announced shortly.
“We couldn’t be more excited than to begin 2018 by announcing the return of Mad Catz to the global gaming arena. Mad Catz has been a permanent fixture in gaming for almost three decades and we firmly believe it’s best days lie ahead,” said Selena Chang, Director of Sales and Operations for Mad Catz Global Limited. “Through listening to gamers worldwide, we plan to once again forge a path of innovation in the gaming hardware community, and we’re already working on delivering products which we believe will enhance gamers’ abilities and do justice to the Mad Catz name. We can’t wait to unveil a little more at CES 2018 and in the months to come.’
Ni no Kuni fans can pre-order their Regal Edition of Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom and start a journey that will enchant both their consoles and their hearts. With limited stock available in the UK with the King’s Edition nearly sold out, and the Prince’s Edition selling out fast!
PRINCE’S EDITION:
PlayStation 4: Full Game, The Kingmakers: An exclusive making-of Ni no Kuni II on Bluray disc that will reveal the hidden secrets of the game’s design and development, a SteelBook™ case and the Season Pass – Exclusive to GAME in the UK and Smyths Toys in Ireland
KING’S EDITION:
PlayStation 4 and PC: The full Game (for PC this will be in the form of a digital code) and all the content listed in the King’s Edition: the vinyl, the making-of Bluray, the diorama music box, the artbook, SteelBook™ and Season Pass – Available to pre-order in the UK at the following retailers:
For those who pre-order the game a Special Sword set (5 weapons) will be available for free.
The Season Pass included in the PRINCE’S and KING’S EDITION will feature 2 additional pieces of content and will be available as a standalone purchase.
Ni no Kuni II: REVENANT KINGDOM will be available on the PlayStation 4 system and PC.
Nintendo and Koei Tecmo make for strange bedfellows and yet a game like Hyrule Warriors not only became a reality, but it was well enough received for Nintendo to let Koei Tecmo play around with another of its key franchises. Albeit it makes use of the same concept, Fire Emblem Warriors has the potential to benefit from the strategic aspect of the franchise.
Today Centria Connected Home the smart home brand of Hive has just announced the new smart indoor camera called Hive View.
With Hive customer research it showed that a clear desire for an indoor camera that fitted more naturally into a home environment and provided useful functionality to give added peace of mind. Continuing the collaboration with renowned designer and fuseproject founder Yves Béhar, the standout feature for the Hive Live is the “Grad and Go”, as where the lightweight camera disconnects from it ultra thin stand and can be placed in any areas in the home.
The Hive View is equipped with features like HD live streaming, person detection and camera history that can be accessed anytime, anywhere all controlled through the Hive app.
With the Hive View simple to set up, it works within minutes of unboxing, it is easily manoeuvred to offer the best possible view with a choice of wall, shelf or magnetic mount. All three can rotate, flex and come with a wide 130° field of view on the Hive View.
The Hive View will only capture content once it’s triggered, it will automatically start recording and send a notification informing it has detected motion or a sound. It can also be set to detect only people, so won’t be triggered by family pets, this will ensure you are only notified of what matters to them. By using the Hive app, people can watch a secure Livestream in 1080p HD, even when it is dark. Captured content can be viewed for 24 hours as standard, with customers will be able to upgrade to Hive Video Playback membership, a new service giving a 30-day rolling video history (£4.99), all easily and securely accessed from anywhere. Hive View also comes with a privacy mode, so it records only when needed via the Hive app or through set schedules.
That’s not all next month (February 2018), Centrica Connected Home will launch enhanced Hive actions which will enable easy linking of Hive devices via the app so they work together.
The New Hive Close to Home Plan, built around Hive View, comes with a family of Hive devices and Hive Video Playback membership. The plan spreads the total cost across a year through 12 interest-free monthly payments, following which you would own the devices outright and the monthly fee is reduced to Hive Video Playback membership.
Hive View is available now in the UK and US for $199.99 (£189) or £319 for a two camera pack, you can have the Hive Video Playback membership for £4.99 per month. The Hive Close to Homeplan (including Hive View, two Hive Active Lights, two Hive Window or Door sensors, a Hive Active Plug, Hive Hub, 30-day cloud storage and host of other benefits) is available for £39.99 per month, it is then reduced to £4.99 per month after 12 months. If you are existing customers with a Hive Hub already, then the plan is available for £26.99 per month.
It’s competition time again, and this time we are offering yet another lucky winner the chance to own a Sennheiser’s PC 373D Gaming Headset worth over £200!
Sennheiser’s PC 373D is a high-end open acoustic gaming headset that delivers incredibly immersive 7.1 Dolby Surround Sound and crystal clear gaming communications thanks to its high-quality, noise-cancelling microphone. The sleek Surround Dongle and powerful PC software perfectly optimize your experience for competitive and immersive gaming, and even music.
How to enter to win
We have another Sennheiser PC 373D Gaming Headset worth over £200 to give away!
It’s time for our Two Minute Review of the Charging Station for Nintendo Switch from Venom.
Never miss a second of the action, with our Quad Charging Station, your Joy-Cons will be charged in no time.
Features
Dock, store and charge up to four Joy-Con controllers simultaneously
LED indicators show charge status for each dock
Easy slide on connection and quick release button system
Includes USB 3.0 charging cable
Charge via your Nintendo Switch console or any other USB output device
Who are Venom?
From their website:
“Since 1999, UK based Venom has designed and manufactured gaming accessories. We pride ourselves on producing quality products at an affordable price. All our products are designed in the UK by our dedicated design team to create desirable accessories to enhance the gaming experience.”
What’s in the box?
The box contains the charging station, user instructions and a cable.
A Closer Look
In Use
Final Thoughts
The first thing you notice about the Charging Station is that it is quite small, which is good!
Connect the USB cable to the charging station and the other end to a PC or your Switch and you are ready to go. You will probably want to buy a plug to connect the USB cable into so that you can leave it connected all the time for charging without the need to use a PC or Switch.
The charging station can hold two pairs of Nintendo Switch controllers and they slot in easily and can be easily removed.
When the controllers are connected and charging there are charging lights that show you status of the charge so you can easily tell when they are fully charged.
If you have a Nintendo Switch, then the Charging Station from Venom is a must have for your collection!
It’s time for our Two Minute Review of the Twin Docking Station for Xbox One from Venom.
Keep controllers fully charged and ready for action with Venom’s smart Twin Docking Station. The rapid recharge cradle enables you to power up two wireless controllers without needing to leave your Xbox One on. Featuring a polished black finish to match your Xbox One controllers, red charging LED indicators turn green once fully charged. Two powerful Nimh rechargeable battery packs provide maximum power for gameplay of up to 18 hours.
Features
Dock, store and charge
Rapid recharge cradle for 2 Xbox One wireless controllers
Keep controllers fully charged and ready to use
Supplied with x2 Nimh rechargeable battery packs
Charges whilst on standby
Polished black finish to match controllers
Red LED charge indicators turn to green once controllers are fully charged
Up to 18 hours gameplay
Charges via USB cable (included)
Who are Venom?
From their website:
“Since 1999, UK based Venom has designed and manufactured gaming accessories. We pride ourselves on producing quality products at an affordable price. All our products are designed in the UK by our dedicated design team to create desirable accessories to enhance the gaming experience.”
What’s in the box?
The box contains the charging station, user instructions, a cable and the two batteries for your controllers.
A Closer Look
In Use
Final Thoughts
If you play a lot of Xbox games then you probably have gone through a lot of batteries or have had to remember to charge your controllers whenever you have finished playing with them. The Twin Docking Station from Venom helps deal with this problem by not only providing a rechargeable battery for your controller, well two controllers, but also a docking station for them to sit on.
Whenever the controller is sitting in the docking station the batteries will recharge. It is important to note that the controllers can only be charged from the docking station.
Venom claim that you can get around 18 hours from a full charge, however this will depend a lot on what game you are playing and whether or not there is a lot of feedback coming from the controller. Even when playing a game with a lot of controller feedback we still managed to get over 8 hours from a single charge, which is a good amount! Although when they batteries start to go you don’t have a lot of time before they are totally flat.
They controllers charge up fairly quickly and you can easily see if the charging has completed by the colour of the front LED on the docking station.
The docking station itself also looks a little “plasticy” but to be honest it does it’s job so is it really that important how it looks? To some people, maybe!
All in all, the Twin Docking Station for Xbox One is a good addition to any Xbox gamers kit, enabling them to have someone to sit their controllers, but to also have them charge at the same time.
The Cyrus One is a stereo amplifier that now comes with 3 months free access to music streaming service TIDAL – here is our review.
This is how Cyrus describe the One:
“Breath-taking audio from a single box integrated amplifier. Compact, yet boasting an incredible audio specification. Send Bluetooth from your phone, directly connect a record player, or plug in Google’s Chromecast audio for CD quality streamed music. It also has sound for pound, one of the best headphone amplifiers money can buy. ONE is the standard by which others are measured.”
Specifications
What’s in the Box?
The box contains the Cyrus One, a small remote control, power cables, paperwork and a manual on a CD.
TIDAL delivers seamless listening across mobile, tablet, desktop and network players. Enjoy lossless music streaming on Apple devices from iPhone, iPad and iPod to Mac, as well as on PC and Android systems. Plus integration in a wide range of high fidelity network players – the Cyrus One being one of them.
Once you have created your TIDAL account you need to download and install the software on either your computer or your phone / tablet. Just choose your device, download the software and away you go.
Once that’s done you can start searching for music you want to listen to.
And it’s very easy to add music to your playlists so that you can listen to them via any device.
You can then start to play your selected music directly to the Cyrus One (ensuring you have Bluetooth selected on the One).
TIDAL is available in more than 52 countries, with more than a 51 million song catalog and 192,000 high quality videos – so there’s bound to be something you want to listen to.
Final Thoughts
The Cyrus One comes very well packaged – don’t forget to take note of the 3 month subscription code for TIDAL that will be on the box.
Once you have taken the Cyrus One out of the box and connected it all up you should update the firmware. This was a simple process and just involves downloading the firmware update file to your PC or Mac, connecting that to the One via a USB cable and then running the update file – simple!
Connected up a set of speakers was simple – and if you are not sure which connectors to connect the speaker cables to, there are diagrams in the box to help you do it.
It is also easy to connect up various other devices, such as a record player and also a Google Chromecast device.
The front of the One has a power switch and two large dials. The left hand dial enables you to select which audio input you want to use – the first one is aptX Bluetooth. The right hand dial is the volume. When you first power on the One all the lights one on sequentially.
There is also a remote control but to be honest it’s very small and doesn’t have many features, and you are more likely to use the Cyrus One app for your smartphone than the remote.
Given the cost of the One itself the remote is a little disappointing and feels a little cheap.
Sound wise though the One is great – really great in fact. The sound really comes through well from any of the sources hooked up to it, with 100 watts per channel.
Which brings us nicely onto TIDAL. TIDAL is a music streaming service that delivers lossless audio and is available via subscription.
TIDAL’s HiFi tier is the leading standard in lossless audio streaming. Simply selecting the Chromecast option which automatically appears in the TIDAL App, music lovers can enjoy millions of tracks in hi-fi quality. In partnership with MQA (Master Quality Authenticated), TIDAL offers ‘Master’ quality audio in over 105,000 tracks from Warner Music Group, TIDAL artist owners and key independent labels. The platform is continuing to add more master-quality content, allowing fans to hear music the way the artist intended. Superior to regular or even aptX Bluetooth, streaming via Chromecast Audio affords music streaming without compromise, with zero compression delivering lossless audio that reveals staggering detail and clarity. Unlike the majority of consumer streaming devices, Chromecast Audio features a high-specification DAC (Digital Analogue Converter), widely revered for its ability to deliver incredible levels of audio detail.
You can streaming TIDAL from your phone, your tablet or your computer, and setting up and using TIDAL is very easy. Just look for whatever music you want, and hit play, and just sit back and enjoy the lossless quality coming through your speakers. And you really can tell the difference listening to it too!
The Cyrus One has been available for a while now, but the inclusion of Google Chromecast, along with a three month trial of TIDAL really makes the package worth while and worth taking a look at if you had skipped it before.
The Cyrus One with TIDAL is available now priced around £699 and if you are in the market for a great quality amp along with a lossless streaming service, that you should definitely take a look, and a listen, to this one!
Two colour variants will launch Black and Brush Copper and White and Champagne Gold
