The Motorola Edge (2024) came out in late June and pairs a Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 with a 144Hz OLED display, a curved 6.6” FHD+ panel. The premium design features an aluminum frame and faux leather on the back. It’s not style over function, though, the phone is rated IP68 for dust and water resistance and supports both 68W wired and 15W wireless charging for the 5,000mAh battery.
The chipset isn’t the fastest and 8GB of RAM isn’t huge, but it’s enough to run Motorola’s Ready For desktop environment over USB-C. There is a 50MP camera on the back (1/1.5”, OIS) and a 13MP ultra wide (120°), plus a 32MP selfie camera on the front.
For $200 less, there is the Motorola Moto G Power (2024). This one also sports a faux leather back, but it loses the full water resistance and instead has a basic water-repellent design. The battery has the same 5,000mAh capacity and 15W wireless charging, while wired charging has been pared back to 30W.
The front is a flat 6.7” IPS LCD (FHD+, 120Hz) and inside is a Dimensity 7020 chipset with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of expandable storage (we will look at microSD cards at the end of this post). The 50MP main camera has a smaller sensor (with 0.64µm pixels instead of 1.0µm like on the Edge) and can’t record 4K video. Joining it are an 8MP ultra wide (118°) and a 16MP selfie cameras. This phone also has a 3.5mm headphone jack.
Not everyone insists on getting the latest iPhone and the 15 series will be replaced next month, anyway. The iPhone 14 is still going strong and right now both it and the Plus are $75 off at Best Buy.
Compared to the iPhone 15 (Plus), you will be missing out on USB-C and the 48MP main camera (these only have 12MP modules). The display has a wide notch too, which isn’t the most attractive design element. That it runs at 60Hz is even worse, but ProMotion isn’t coming to vanilla iPhones anytime soon.
Instead of new units, you could also pick up premium renewed units from Amazon. Premium means that there is no visible cosmetic damage (“when held from 12 inches away,” says Amazon). These are unlocked units, but you can get a carrier version for a bit less.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite (2024) has proven to be a successful design. This is the third edition of the slate and it strikes a good balance between features – 10.4” 60Hz LCD, octa-core processor, stereo AKG speakers and DeX – with price. Note that the USB-C port doesn’t do video out.
Earlier this week Samsung unveiled new microSD cards in the Pro Plus and Evo Plus series. Both are rated V30 for 4K video recording and U1 for general file storage, as well as A2 for applications. The Pro models are a bit faster (Pro: 180MB/s sequential read, 130MB/s write vs. Evo: 160MB/s and 120MB/s), while the Evo is a bit cheaper.
Finally, Sony’s PlayStation VR2 headset comes bundled with a well-regarded VR game (Horizon Call of the Mountain) and the combo is 33% off. This requires a PS5 to play, obviously, but you can also get an adapter and use the capable VR headset with your PC as well.
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