Xiaomi just handed Apple a brilliant way to reinvent MagSafe—except this time, it’s not about charging. At MWC 2025, I saw a concept that could redefine smartphone photography altogether: Xiaomi’s Modular Optical System. It takes the biggest limitation of smartphone cameras—their tiny sensors and restrictive optics—and fixes it with a simple snap-on lens. Instead of trying to cram larger sensors into increasingly massive camera bumps, Xiaomi outsources the optics to an external lens that attaches magnetically, letting the phone handle the processing while the lens does the heavy lifting.

Your phone is already a powerhouse. It runs AI-enhanced computational photography, processes RAW images in milliseconds, and even records 4K video with real-time stabilization. The only thing holding it back from being a true professional camera is physics. Sensors need space, and high-end lenses aren’t exactly pocket-friendly. That’s where Xiaomi’s solution comes in. By separating the sensor and optics into a modular attachment, the system achieves a best-of-both-worlds approach. You get professional-grade optics with the power of AI-driven post-processing—all without making your phone look like it’s carrying a brick on its back.

Designer: Xiaomi

The concept I tested at MWC featured a Xiaomi 35mm f/1.4 lens with a 100MP Light Fusion X Type 4/3 sensor, which is more than double the size of any sensor currently found in smartphones. The aperture range makes it excellent for low-light photography, and thanks to the dedicated optics, there’s no need for artificial portrait blur. The bokeh effect is real, created naturally by the lens instead of being generated through edge-detection algorithms that often struggle with complex subjects like hair or eyeglasses. Lean into your phone’s computational camera app and you can exaggerate that bokeh even more, showing how the handshake of hardware and software can really give these camera phones an edge over DSLRs or mirrorless counterparts.

Attaching the lens to the phone felt like snapping on a MagSafe accessory. It connected magnetically, aligning perfectly thanks to small pogo pins for power transfer. But the real magic is in Xiaomi’s proprietary LaserLink technology, which uses near-infrared laser communication to transfer image data at speeds up to 10 Gbps. That’s fast enough for real-time photo capture, video recording, and computational enhancements without noticeable lag. It felt as seamless as using a built-in camera, but with the undeniable quality of a dedicated system.

Once attached, the camera app recognizes the modular lens instantly. Switching between the built-in camera and the detachable lens was as simple as tapping an icon. Autofocus worked smoothly, thanks to a built-in motor, but Xiaomi also included a physical focus ring—something photographers will appreciate. Shooting in Pro mode, I had full manual control over shutter speed, ISO, and white balance, making it feel like a proper mirrorless camera experience, minus the bulky body. RAW capture was available too, ensuring photographers could get the most detail out of their shots.

One of the biggest advantages of this system is what it does to smartphone design. With the sensor and optics moved to an external module, flagship smartphones no longer need enormous camera bumps. The recent trend of oversized camera modules has made phones thicker, less ergonomic, and sometimes incompatible with wireless charging. Xiaomi’s approach eliminates that problem entirely. In theory, this could lead to slimmer, more balanced phone designs while giving users the flexibility to attach high-end lenses only when needed.

The implications of this modular system go beyond photography. LaserLink’s high-speed data transfer and magnetic attachment system could pave the way for a new ecosystem of accessories. Imagine snapping on an external gimbal for stabilization, a professional-grade microphone for video recording, or even gaming accessories that benefit from the low-latency connection. While Xiaomi hasn’t announced any additional modules, the potential is obvious.

Of course, modular phone concepts have been attempted before, with varying degrees of success. LG’s Friends modules, Motorola’s Moto Mods, and Google’s Project Ara all aimed to introduce swappable components, but they never gained mass adoption. The CMF Phone tried to dabble with modularity too, but it was more open-sourced than actually creating an ecosystem of tech modules. Xiaomi’s approach feels different because it doesn’t try to make the entire phone modular—just the part that truly benefits from it. The challenge will be whether users are willing to carry additional lenses, but for photography enthusiasts, that’s hardly a deal-breaker.

For now, the Xiaomi Modular Optical System is still a concept with no official release date or pricing. But after testing it at MWC, I can say this: It’s one of the most exciting smartphone photography innovations in years. With smartphone AI advancing at an incredible pace, pairing it with professional optics makes perfect sense. This could be the first step toward a future where flagship phones are no longer constrained by physical camera limitations, but instead, embrace modularity to push mobile photography beyond what we thought was possible.

The post Xiaomi Just Gave Apple The Most Brilliant MagSafe Accessory Idea Ever: Hands-On At MWC 2025 first appeared on Yanko Design.

The folks at Iconfactory, which once made a wonderful Twitter client called Twitterrific, launched a new app on Tuesday. It’s called Tapestry, and it’s a cross between a social app and a news reader. The app can ingest feeds of all kinds: someone’s Bluesky posts, your favorite YouTube creator’s videos, a blog’s new posts, all your go-to podcasts. You add the feeds, and Tapestry shows them to you in chronological order. No recommendations, no algorithms, just what Iconfactory calls a “personal, unified timeline” of content you care about.

Tapestry has a bunch of clever ways to filter your content, too. You can pick keywords to “Muffle,” which will make their entry in Tapestry much smaller, or you can mute them and remove them from your timeline entirely. You can search across all your feeds at once, too, and create timelines within your timeline — I set one up for my podcast feeds, for instance, and now Tapestry is a passable podcast player. Tapestry syncs both your content and your place in the timeline across devices, and it gives you lots of control over how things look.

I’ve been using Tapestry in beta for a while, and I quite like the app. It’s fairly …

Read the full story at The Verge.

For the first time ever, every one of Peter Jackson’s Middle-earth films will be available in a single box set. The six-film Middle-earth collection features the theatrical and extended cuts of both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies and is currently available to pre-order for $209.99 on Amazon. The 30 discs included in this box set feature the 4K and Blu-ray versions of both trilogies, along with the associated commentaries and bonus content for every film, totaling roughly 38 hours of footage. That’s more than a day and a half to barrage your friends with your encyclopedic knowledge of LOTR trivia!

While this box set is the perfect way to get the best version of every Middle-earth movie in one place, it doesn’t include any special collector’s items like the 4K version of The Lord of the Rings trilogy that launched back in Oct. and came packaged with a replica of The One Ring and a decorative slipcase.

Despite scandal after scandal, Koreans have shown their solidarity with one another, and the resilience of their institutions

Compared with other advanced industrialised countries, South Korea is still a young democracy, having only transitioned from authoritarian to democratic rule in 1987. However, the political freedoms and beliefs Koreans have come to take for granted were suddenly shattered on 3 December, when President Yoon Suk Yeol declared martial law, citing anti-state activities and collaboration with North Korea by some political actors as his reason for doing so.

His actions utterly shocked the country, and MPs promptly gathered at the national assembly in a clear act of defiance of the ban on political activities that accompanied the imposition of martial law. All 190 members of parliament who were present that night (out of a total of 300) had made it through the cordons of special forces around the parliament building and voted to nullify the law within hours of its imposition. President Yoon quickly repealed the law. Tens of thousands of ordinary citizens filled the streets around the national assembly calling for presidential impeachment. It took two attempts before enough MPs would vote to impeach the president. Watching Yoon appear at his impeachment hearing today, these may appear to be very dark days for democracy. But in reality, these events should give Koreans hope.

Youngmi Kim is senior lecturer at the University of Edinburgh and director of the Scottish Centre for Korean Studies

At CES 2025, XGIMI introduced a new concept product that could eventually make its way to people's houses. The XGIMI Ascend is a 2-in-1 ALR projector screen that rises up out of a big soundbar speaker system. It also happens to perfectly match the company's latest AURA 2 projector. That said, forget about OLED TVs or TVs with AI and cameras because this new device is so much cooler.

According to the company, this concept product combines a roll-up Ambient Light Rejection screen and two premium Harman Kardon soundbars in a seamless, motorized, compact design. The XGIMI Ascend concept introduces a 100-inch motorized floor-rising screen, which can "elevate home entertainment with unparalleled ease and sophistication."

This device pairs with XGIMI's AURA 2, its ultra-short-throw projector, unveiled in September at a NYC event. Over the past year, BGR had the chance to get exclusive hands-on with the AURA 2 before its release.

Aura 2 delivers the best-in-class short-thrown XGIMI's home projection Image source: José Adorno for BGR

With cinema-level audio and visual capabilities packed in a sleek short-throw projection unibody, the AURA 2 also features the Dual Light 2.0 tech and offers ultra-high brightness and color accuracy with 2,300 ISO lumens with IMAX Enhanced and Dolby Vision certifications. Its DCIP-P3 color gamut coverage is 99%, allowing for excellent and precise reproduction of colors. It also has immersive theater sound quality thanks to four built-in Harman/Kardon 15W 2-channel speakers.

Now, XGIMI leverages this experience with this concept product unveiled at CES 2025. The company says it's engineered to function both as a cinematic screen and an ambiance-enhancing display. XGIMI states that this product has a wide-viewing angle and advanced contrast ratio enhancement that rejects ambient light; it also provides exceptional clarity and vibrancy across various lighting conditions, making it ideal for any space.

"We’re thrilled to introduce Ascend at CES 2025 and showcase our latest technological explorations," said Apollo Zhong, CEO of XGIMI. "Ascend is a symbol of our dedication to continuous innovation in home entertainment and a testament to our drive to provide users with powerful, elegant solutions that enhance their everyday lives. It’s the type of jaw-dropping product that belongs at CES, and we’re so excited to gather feedback from technologists at the show."

While it's unclear when this concept product can become a reality, you can read BGR's review of the XGIMI HORIZON S Max and MoGo 3 Pro.

The post XGIMI Ascend is so much cooler than any new TV announced at CES 2025 appeared first on BGR.

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XGIMI Ascend is so much cooler than any new TV announced at CES 2025 originally appeared on BGR.com on Wed, 8 Jan 2025 at 07:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

With the Wi-Fi HaLow’s 9.9 mile range, you could connect to your home Wi-Fi at work, at the grocery store, and even inside your car throughout your ride.

Wi-Fi is probably the most important part of any piece of technology today. It helps devices connect, communicate, update, and be cutting-edge… but the problem with Wi-Fi is that it’s a high-frequency radio wave – that means it doesn’t travel far, and it can’t penetrate walls. It’s why we recommend placing Wi-Fi routers strategically at home so that you get seamless connectivity, but there’s a company hoping to make Wi-Fi so powerful, it passes through walls and can even connect devices nearly 10 miles apart. The Wi-Fi HaLow, developed by Morse Micro, is an upcoming technology that the company hopes will become a part of every device in the future… so that bad internet connectivity is a thing of the past.

Designer: Morse Micro

Without getting into the specifics (because I have no technical background), the Wi-Fi HaLow router (shown above) promises to make internet connectivity seamless over massive distances. It relies on Sub-GHz frequency waves that travel long distances (like AM and FM radio) to transmit internet connectivity, so you could potentially use your home Wi-Fi router within a 10-mile radius of your house.

Morse Micro, the company behind the tech, hopes that this Wi-Fi capability will coexist with current 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz Wi-Fi bands. These existing bands are great for low-latency internet connectivity, but add HaLow to the mix and you get long-distance connectivity too, giving you the best of all worlds. Sub-GHz Wi-Fi won’t ever be as fast as 5GHz Wi-Fi (HaLow has max speeds of 32.5 MB/s), although those speeds are perfect for most everyday tasks like checking email, browsing the internet, or even for IoT devices to communicate with each other.

Sadly, the router isn’t something you can currently just plug into your home. While it does broadcast long-distance Wi-Fi, most devices like your phones, laptops, and smart home tech aren’t equipped to read that frequency band just yet… but Morse Micro is hoping to influence tech companies to adapt their hardware for the future so that instead of dual-band radio antennas, every device will have a tri-band radio antenna for 2.4, 5, and Sub GHz connectivity.

For now, Morse Micro’s working to deploy HaLows in commercial setups like Amazon warehouses (where robots can communicate seamlessly with each other over long distances), along with other industries like security and telecom. Potentially, this technology isn’t too far off. Imagine your lawnmower robot being able to easily connect to your home Wi-Fi without an intermediary hub, or your pool cleaning robot doing the same even if your pool is more than 20-30 meters from your home router.

The devices shown here are engineering samples. Morse Micro is sharing chipsets, dongles, and routers with engineers interested in building the tech into their existing stacks, so that potentially in the future your home Wi-Fi could also be your work Wi-Fi or your car Wi-Fi. And instead of asking your friend to share the Wi-Fi password when you’re at their place, you can just continue using your home Wi-Fi just fine!

The post This Game-Changing Wi-Fi Router at CES 2025 has a Connectivity Radius of 9.9 Miles first appeared on Yanko Design.