Alex Cranz, Author at Gizmodo

We Fucked Up Some ‘Rugged’ Storage Drives With a Machete

The price of solid state drives has been on a steady decline for the last year, and they’re already a top pick for easily improving the performance of your laptop, desktop, or even your PS4. But they also make really fantastic external drives—if more expensive than a traditional hard drive. The reason? SSDs have zero…

Tech News Alex Cranz

When It Comes to Gaming, the iPhone Will Always Stomp the Competition

Okay. The great spring phone glut is over. The big manufacturers have revealed their flagship devices. Apple even joined in with a cheaper alternative to its flagship iPhone. I’ve spent the last few months benchmarking a lot of phones, and something has become exceedingly clear: All the CPU and GPU benchmarks in the world can’t…

Tech News Alex Cranz

We Slashed and Stabbed a Kevlar Jacket to See If It’s Assassin Proof

Thanks to Batman, Daredevil, and a slew of other grim looking dudes with a desire to punch people, Kevlar has a reputation for being amazing body armor. But real Kevlar body armor tends to be super thick, bulky, and limited to torso protection. For a less chunky option, there’s Walls outdoor wear, which uses Kevlar…

Tech News Alex Cranz

The New HTC 10 Actually Shows Some Fresh Ideas

HTC is thirsty for your dollars. To that end they’ve announced a new phone, the HTC 10, and despite looking like a rip off of all the other phones out there, it actually has a new idea packed into its glass and shiny metal chassis. The Taiwanese technology company is a business, so it’s a…

Tech News Alex Cranz

Leak of New Amazon E-Reader Suggests It’s Flipping Cool

E-readers get a bad rap—probably because there are a lot of illiterate assholes out there who hate reading. For the rest of us totally wicked people e-readers are amazing and Amazon’s rumored announcement of a new e-reader is a cause to celebrate. Liliputing is reporting that Amazon’s newest Kindle e-reader will include an accelerometer so…

Commerce Alex Cranz

The History of Femslash, the Tiny Fandom That’s Taking Over the Universe

The death of a minor supporting character on a tiny CW show set of a huge discussion about the representation of the LBGTQ community on TV, and this caught most people by surprise. Yet here we are, a month after The 100 aired the inciting incident, still talking about it. What’s keeping this discussion going?…

io9 Alex Cranz

Playstation VR Is Ridiculously Polished For Something Still in Development

When Sony announced a release date for Playstation VR a few weeks ago, I felt simultaneously excited at the potential of the platform and skeptical about what Sony would actually be able to accomplish with nothing more than a giant headset, a Playstation 4 Camera, and the PS4’s relatively middling power. Can it really compete…

Tech News Alex Cranz

Playing PS4 Games On a Mac Is Surprisingly Easy

Sony PS4 owners should update their consoles today. The new 3.50 system software update brings a bounty of desired features, including the ability to appear as if you’re offline (useful to avoid friends who want you to get back into Destiny when you’re currently into The Division) and to schedule online events (useful when your…

Tech News Alex Cranz

Forget The Rift, Gear VR is the Only Headset Worth Buying

After years of stomach-churning anticipation, it’s all over—the VR headsets of the future are here. The Rift gives you an engaging experience with a handful of excellent games. Meanwhile, the Vive gives you unprecedented control of your virtual surroundings. But as extraordinary as both devices are, they’re absolute bunk compared to the best VR headset…

Tech News Alex Cranz

New Smaller Roku Stick Makes It Easier to Watch TV Without Annoying Your Roommates

The Roku Stick has always been a fantastic device. It’s as small as a Chromecast, but doesn’t require an entire additional phone/tablet/laptop to work. It just wedges Roku’s excellent smart TV OS into a HDMI stick, which is just a tad big three times as large as a thumb drive. Make that twice as large.…

Television Alex Cranz

The Smaller iPad Pro: Yes, You Want One

Tablets haven’t had a great time lately. In the last two years, sales have plummeted and production has slowed to a crawl. While a lot of that is due to the fact they don’t have the manic upgrade calendar of traditional computers or smartphones, it’s also because they’re really all about consuming the internet. You…

Reviews Alex Cranz

iPhone SE Review: The Phone That Proves Apple Is Out of Ideas

As a tiny-fisted, lady pockets rocking iPhone 6 user, I have been very excited about the iPhone SE. I’m not the only one. As soon as people hear I have it, they implore me to whip it out. We hold our phones together like boys in the locker room and compare sizes. “It’s so tiny,”…

Reviews Alex Cranz

Daredevil Actually Looks Like a Comic Book on LG’s $8000 OLED TV

Television, despite what the manufacturers are saying, is in a pretty boring place at the moment. The jump to color from black and white, to high definition from standard—even the unmitigated failure that was 3D—those were moments in TV history. What we’ve currently got is gentle, natural leaps in picture quality: wider color gamuts and…

Reviews Alex Cranz

This Vape is Like Shooting Vodka After Years of Gin

There’s a reason the Firefly 2 and Pax 2 stand out from other vapes—beyond being big eye-catching kazoos. They’re unique. A lot of the vape market is reminiscent of the hoverboard market. A few companies make the products and a whole mess of other companies slap their logos on them and sell them. Grenco’s been…

Reviews Alex Cranz

This Time Machine For Pisstanks Will Age Bad Whiskey in a Day

Oak and alcohol go hand in hand. Vineyards regularly use it to enhance the flavor of their wine, and distilleries put their whiskeys in oak barrels to provide the booze with that coveted vanilla note. But imparting all that flavor can take years, and the longer alcohol ages in the barrel the more expensive it…

Tech News Alex Cranz

This Smart Wine Bottle Makes Getting Drunk Way Too Complicated

According to some people (our esteemed editor-in-chief) the biggest problem with wine is that eventually you have to go buy more wine because you killed the bottle. For others (like myself) the biggest problem is that you don’t always kill the $30+ bottle of wine in a night. The wine’s flavor changes over the next…

Reviews Alex Cranz

Fitbit Alta Review: This Is Why People Like Fitness Trackers

Everyone knows Fitbit: The proud Fitbit data announcements of that dude from high school on Facebook, the friend who wears a Zip on their hip or your coworker with a Charge on their wrist. It’s the best-known name in fitness trackers. But it’s had a rough time lately. People slammed its first genuine smartwatch, the…

Reviews Alex Cranz

Colony Is Getting Really Good, You Guys

It seemed like just another basic cable science fiction drama. Aliens invade Earth, and pretty actors—many of them genre alumni—are forced into colonies where they plot to stop the aliens. The action is great, but the family moments are treacly enough to give you Falling Skies flashbacks. But Colony is actually good, guys. It’s really,…

Television Alex Cranz

Samsung Chases The Surface With Galaxy TabPro S

Apple is the innovator and Microsoft is the imitator. That’s long been the prevailing narrative, but with the Surface and the Surface Book, things changed. The Microsoft Surface Book has a really neat hinge, and the Surface is the first 2-in-1 to not suck. It’s so good that Apple even aped it, with middling results.…

Reviews Alex Cranz

The Best Superman Stories Remember That He’s an Immigrant

Despite being on television continuously from 1988 to 2010, Superman has only had two interpretations on the big screen in the past 40 years: Richard Donner’s Silver Age-inspired fella who eradicates memories with a kiss, and Zack Snyder’s Superman. The latter version is back in a couple days, facing off against Batman—and in an effort…

io9 Alex Cranz

Alex Cranz

We Fucked Up Some ‘Rugged’ Storage Drives With a Machete

When It Comes to Gaming, the iPhone Will Always Stomp the Competition

We Slashed and Stabbed a Kevlar Jacket to See If It’s Assassin Proof

The New HTC 10 Actually Shows Some Fresh Ideas

Leak of New Amazon E-Reader Suggests It’s Flipping Cool

The History of Femslash, the Tiny Fandom That’s Taking Over the Universe

Playstation VR Is Ridiculously Polished For Something Still in Development

Playing PS4 Games On a Mac Is Surprisingly Easy

Forget The Rift, Gear VR is the Only Headset Worth Buying

New Smaller Roku Stick Makes It Easier to Watch TV Without Annoying Your Roommates

The Smaller iPad Pro: Yes, You Want One

iPhone SE Review: The Phone That Proves Apple Is Out of Ideas

Daredevil Actually Looks Like a Comic Book on LG’s $8000 OLED TV

This Vape is Like Shooting Vodka After Years of Gin

This Time Machine For Pisstanks Will Age Bad Whiskey in a Day

This Smart Wine Bottle Makes Getting Drunk Way Too Complicated

Fitbit Alta Review: This Is Why People Like Fitness Trackers

Colony Is Getting Really Good, You Guys

Samsung Chases The Surface With Galaxy TabPro S

The Best Superman Stories Remember That He’s an Immigrant

Ahead of the SpaceX IPO, xAI Has Now Shed All 11 of Its Non-Elon Musk Founders

Do ‘Disclosure Day’ Prep With a Spielberg Sci-Fi Marathon

How to Watch the F1 Japanese GP 2026 on a Free Channel

Ranking 2016’s Superhero Debuts, 10 Years Later

Fourth Most Populous Country in the World Bans Most Social Media for Kids

How to watch UFC Fight Night Adesanya vs Pyfer live this Saturday

‘Steel Ball Run’ Will Return This Year…Eventually

‘The Mummy 4’ Is Getting the Family Back Together

JD Vance Says UFOs Are Actually Demons

Breville Barista Express Espresso Machine Hits Its Lowest Price of the Year for Amazon’s Big Spring Sale, Cut Your Daily Coffee Costs at Home

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

Asus ROG’s Massive Swift OLED Gaming Monitor Epitomizes Excess in the Best Way

The Ikea Varmblixt Smart Lamp Fills a Donut Hole in My Life

Nothing Headphone A vs. Headphone 1: Which Pair of ANC Wireless Headphones Wins?

Asus ROG’s Cetra Open Wireless Gaming Earbuds Might Be Better Than Wearing a Headset

Nintendo’s Talking Flower Is Annoying as Hell. I Love It

Level Lock Pro Review: As Good as a Secret Smart Lock Gets

Apple Studio Display XDR Review: It Looks So Good, I Wish It Were an iMac

RayNeo Air 4 Pro Review: My Eyes Love These Video Glasses, but My Nose Disagrees