Lilbits: Google Nest Audio, Xiaomi Mi 10T, Amazon Fire TV Stick Lite, and more

Google announced two new phones, a new media streamer, and a bunch of new software features today. But the company also finally released an update to the Google Home smart speaker that launched almost four years ago.

The new Google Nest Audio is a $100 smart speaker that the company says offers louder sound, deeper bass, and an overall better experience, while selling for about $30 less than the launch price of the original.

It’s up for pre-order now.

Here’s a roundup of recent tech news from around the web.

• Google launches $100 Nest Audio smart speaker [Google]
  The newest Google smart speaker is the $100 Nest Audio with more bass, more volume than the original Google Home… not to mention yet another rebranding for this product lineup.
• Recorder on the new Pixel phones lets you edit audio straight from the transcript [Android Police]
  Looks like Google is coming for Descript (in a small way). The new version of the Recorder voice memo app for upcoming Pixel phones doesn’t just provide automatic transcription. You can edit the transcript to cut sections of audio.
• Xiaomi launches Mi 10T series trio of smartphones [Mi Blog]
  Xiaomi launches the Mi 10T, Mi 10T Pro, and Mi 10T Lite smartphones, with features including up to a 144 Hz display with AdaptiveSync, up to 108MP camera, 33W fast charging, and Snapdragon 865 or 750G chips, depending on the model.
• Paranoid Android Quartz 5 [Paranoid Android]
  Paranoid Android Quartz 5 released – the latest version of the Android 10 custom ROM adds support for more phones and brings new features including DC dimming and ring mode gestures. The next release will be Paranoid Android Ruby, based on Android 11.
• Expanded extension support in Firefox for Android Nightly [Mozilla]
  Firefox for Android Nightly picks up support for any extension listed on the Firefox add-ons website, bringing support for many extensions that weren’t supported in the latest builds.
• Western Digital launches 2nd-gen SanDisk Extreme Pro portable SSD [AnandTech]
  WD releases 2nd-gen SanDisk Extreme Pro portable USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 SSD that should support data transfer speeds up to 2,000 MBps.
• Intel releases integrated graphics driver for 11th-gen and earlier chips [Intel]
  Intel releases a the first integrated graphics driver to support both 11th-gen Tiger Lake/Iris Xe graphics and earlier generations. Among other things, it supports HDR, Dolby Vision, and HEVC 12-bit.
• Benchmarking the new Fire TV Stick Lite & Fire TV Stick 3 against every other Fire TV model [AFTV News]
  Amazon Fire TV Stick Lite and Fire TV Stick 3 are the same device with a different remote, so it should come as no surprise that they score the same on benchmarks. They’re both an faster than the 2nd-gen Stick and even the Fire TV Stick 4K, but not the Fire TV Cube.
• Fire TV Stick 3 and Fire TV Stick Lite can sideload apps like Kodi and run Downloader [AFTV News]
  Like most Amazon Fire TV devices, the new Fire TV Stick Lite and Fire TV Stick allow you to sideload apps that may not be available in the Amazon Appstore, such as Kodi.
• Windows Timeline support is being removed from Microsoft Launcher on Android [Windows Central]
  Microsoft is removing Timeline from its Android app launcher, suggesting that the feature hasn’t really been all that popular as a way to offer a cross-device look at your recent activities on Windows and Android.
• Announcing Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 20226 [Microsoft]
  Windows Timeline support is being removed from Microsoft Launcher on Android [Windows Central]

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