Add a Touchbar to your keyboard with this sleek, infinitely customizable touchscreen gadget!





The Touchbar on the MacBook honestly felt like a solution without a concrete problem. It was designed to be a highlight feature without a highlight purpose, and was probably reduced to being something that people used just as a volume slider while watching videos. The Touchbar, in my opinion, failed because it lacked the two C’s – Context, and Customizability. CORSAIR’s iCUE NEXUS fixes that with its infinitely customizable little keyboard attachment that does anything from work as a miniature app launcher to a control panel, to even an always-on ticker tape that lets you see your computer stats or the GameStop stock price!

The CORSAIR iCUE NEXUS forms a modular add-on to CORSAIR’s line of high-end performance and gaming gear. The nifty little gadget can be used independently or snapped right to the top of a selection of CORSAIR keyboards, turning them into command-centers. Powered by the company’s iCUE software, the gadget’s screen can be entirely customized, fitting as many as 6 different buttons or modules into it to suit your needs. You can create custom layouts that change based on the program you’re running, and the capacitive-touch display lets you do everything from tapping to sliding. The screen measures 5-inches diagonally, and comes with a resolution of 640×48. The iCUE NEXUS’s power, however, lies in its contextual flexibility, letting you control practically any aspect of your computer with it. As mentioned earlier, you could use it to launch programs, but you could even control options within each program, changing features, display settings, or even controlling your computer audio with it. Moreover, it ties in with CORSAIR’s other equipment too, letting you customize and change color layouts on your keyboard, mouse, and desktop, activate or mute your headphone’s microphone, or even monitor your machine’s performance and control aspects like fan-speed, etc. With the ability to customize up to 256 screens at once, the iCUE NEXUS promises to do what the Touchbar could not. It focuses heavily on context, while giving you an infinite world of customizability.

Designer: CORSAIR

This Nintendo Switch Lite bluetooth adapter lets you connect AirPods to your console

Designed as a sleeker upgrade to Genki’s Bluetooth adapter from 2018, the Genki Audio Lite is a tiny, plug-and-play Bluetooth module that fits right into your Nintendo Switch Lite, allowing you to connect Bluetooth earphones and speakers to your gaming console.

Giving the Nintendo Switch Lite wireless Bluetooth connectivity doesn’t just upgrade the console, it makes sense. The Switch Lite was designed to provide a lighter, less unencumbered gaming experience than the Switch, so providing an aux input literally feels like being bound by a chain… or a wire, to be specific. The Genki Audio Lite’s tiny size adds a great deal of functionality to the already capable device. You can now use your TWS earphones, AirPods, or even the AirPods Max with it, allowing for a portable, private gaming session. The Genki Audio Lite comes with Bluetooth 5.0 and is equipped with aptX™ high fidelity low latency codecs that provide lag-free audio while you game. Although it is as much as 70% slimmer than its predecessor, it does give your Switch Lite a tiny little chin, which is why Genki even has a custom dual magnetic flip case called the Force Field that allows you to keep your Switch Lite protected while the Audio Lite is plugged in.

Designer: Genki

What if the iPhone’s camera module was a detachable, GoPro-style fully functional device?

I’m fully aware that when I’m paying over $1000 for an iPhone, a healthy amount of that is going towards the camera hardware, which everyone will agree is Apple’s crown jewel… so why not just be able to buy that camera module? Louis Berger envisions a Google Project Ara-esque setup where the smartphone’s camera is a detachable module that you can either attach to a larger screen and use as a phone, or pop it out and use it as a standalone shooting device or an action cam.

Called the Mosaic, Berger’s concept is sort of a part-logical-part-sarcastic way of pointing out that camera bumps on phones are so big they might as well be an independent device! The Mosaic isn’t really intended at being an Apple concept, but the camera bump and CMF options seem pretty indicative. Pop it into its smartphone dock and you’ve got a phone with a maxed out camera, take it out and the Mosaic module is just as functional, with a screen on the other side big enough to read and even type out messages. On the lens-side, you’ve got three camera lenses, a ToF sensor, a microphone, and another tiny screen that’s great for basic notifications, or a nice preview window or countdown timer for your camera! The camera module can be even used as a neck-worn or wrist-strapped device, like an activity tracker or smartwatch, and a clip-on accessory lets you mount it on yourself, like a bodycam. It even has its own volume buttons, although the evident lack of real estate on a device so compact means there aren’t any ports on it. How would you charge it then? Well, via the smartphone, apparently.

Berger’s conceptual device addresses a lot of pain-points in consumer tech. Smartphones are expensive, smartwatches don’t have cameras, and the lack of modularity on devices means you need to throw an entire phone or watch away if a part breaks. The Mosaic, with its pretty fun, innovative, and useful design, changes all that. Besides, I’d totally spend north of $1K on a smartphone if I knew I was getting an action camera free with it!

Designer: Louis Berger

Teenage Engineering’s ‘rumble’ module puts haptic bass in the OP-Z

When I reviewed the OP-Z from Teenage Engineering, I was most curious about the expansion port. The diminutive portable synth and sequencer already packed a lot of musical power into a small box. The fact it could be further expanded was exciting. To...

RED blames Chinese manufacturer for its phone’s terrible camera

RED's much-hyped, camera-centric smartphone, the Hydrogen One, received some pretty damning reviews when it launched last year: the screen was poor quality, its headline photo features were disappointing and its camera software was rough around the e...

You know what’s better than a sliding smartphone camera? A detachable one.

I’ll be honest. Sliding cameras are a no-go for me. Here’s why I hate them. Their biggest justification is that sliding cameras create a bezel-less experience, and I honestly don’t have a problem with bezels. A small Samsung S9-style brow and a chin look perfectly fine on a smartphone (I say this as a consumer, not as a design journalist). The other things I hate about sliding cameras are that they catch dust, their presence prevents the phone from being waterproof, and you can’t really put a proper case on them. They also make phones marginally thicker, and a slight problem here or there (a bend perhaps) will render the sliding mechanism useless, basically leaving you with no camera, which isn’t ideal, right?

So what’s the solution? I Nung Huang has one that involves a detachable camera module and a proprietary contact-pin setup that allows you to snap the module to your phone, like the Essential Phone, or Motorola’s Moto Mods. The phone and module are both water-right and dust-resistant, so problem solved there. Looks like the only other foreseeable problem is accidentally losing or dropping the camera mod (like one would with an Airpod), but Huang’s nifty swivel case solves that problem, while also allowing you to use the camera in any orientation (thanks to circuitry within the case itself). What’s better is that this phone is now A. completely bezel-less on the front, and B. more secure, thanks to the removable camera. You know what? Removing the camera may do wonders for your battery life too!

Designer: I-Nung Huang

Meet the small 360 camera module that will fit into phones

You're probably not aware of this, but a Chinese company dubbed ProTruly has already released the world's first two smartphones with a built-in 360 camera last December. Don't worry if you missed the news, because chances are you'd be put off by the...

Linksys is the latest company to unveil a WiFi mesh system

Mesh networking has become trendy for folks looking to fill every nook and cranny of their homes with WiFi. So it should be no surprise that the makers of the most iconic router ever is unveiling its own system. The Linksys tri-band Velop setup is a...