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According to the latest iPhone 17 rumors, Apple is tipped to shake up its flagship smartphone lineup this year with new designs, new specs, and an entirely new model.

Indeed, the much-rumored iPhone 17 Air has been speculated by many to take the place of the iPhone 17 Plus, swapping it for a thin-and-light version of the larger non-Pro Apple phone.

However, as TechRadar readers will know, Apple has been beaten to the punch on this one – we recently covered the announcement of the Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge, which reworks parts of the Galaxy S25 Plus and Galaxy S25 Ultra into an impressively thin handset.

You can ead to our hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge review for a full breakdown – in short, it’s wonderful, but doesn’t come without compromise. The spec sheet suggests that the battery was one of the big targets – the Galaxy S25 Edge comes with a 3,900mAh battery, down from the 4,900mAh battery found in the Galaxy S25 Plus.

But as we've also covered, new rumors have made waves for predicting an iPhone 17 Air battery size that’s even smaller than tech fans might expect, at a surprisingly small 2,800mAh.

For reference, that’s almost 2,000mAh smaller than the 4,674mAh cell found in the iPhone 16 Plus – meaning the iPhone 17 Air could have just 60% of the battery capacity of the phone it’s set to replace.

Though battery life varies by usage, our iPhone 16 Plus review recorded 16 hours and 29 minutes of web browsing – 60% of which is just under 10 hours.

Add in the unavoidable fact that batteries degrade over time and use up a small amount of charge in standby, the prospect of going a full day without charging may begin to seem unlikely.

However, if you ask me there’s no need to panic. There are two specific reasons why a small battery capacity might not be such a big deal for the iPhone 17 Air.

Silicon carbon, capacity saviour

Supposedly leaked renders of the iPhone 17 Air point to a single camera system housed in a bar (Image credit: Front Page Tech / ‪@Zellzoi‬)

Firstly, the iPhone 17 Air could be the first Apple device to use a silicon-carbon battery, rather than a conventional lithium-ion battery.

Silicon-carbon batteries, as their name suggests, use silicon in the anode of the battery, enabling a much greater energy density and improved power efficiency.

That could be just what the iPhone 17 Air needs to push it over the line of true battery life usability.

I’ve tested multiple phones that use silicon-carbon batteries and been impressed with each one; my trusty Oppo Find X8 Pro is still performing admirably in the battery department.

Granted, that’s a huge phone with a 5,910mAh battery, but my point is it still outperforms expectations thanks to its silicon-carbon technology, and that’s a pattern across the handsets that make use of it.

Surprising optimizing

Even though its battery has a relatively small capacity, the iPhone 16 still pushes through a full day of use (Image credit: Future)

Next, we have to consider Apple’s history of getting great performance from smaller than average batteries.

Apple never lists the capacity of its batteries, but unofficial teardowns have revealed that the vanilla iPhone 16 sports a battery capacity of 3,561mAh.

That’s a half-decent capacity, but doesn’t quite live up to the 4,000mAh cell found in the Samsung Galaxy S25 – and both pale in comparison to the Google Pixel 9’s impressive 4,700mAh battery.

However, in our testing, Apple’s most recent baseline flagship kept up with its competitors. Our iPhone 16 review records about 13 hours of usage, while our Pixel 9 review found Google’s flagship lasted for between 13 and 14 hours. That’s not a lot of difference for a gap of more than 1,000mAh.

The key is Apple’s optimization – we don’t know the exact science, but Apple’s longstanding commitment to maintaining a closed, stable mobile ecosystem means its hardware and software are literally built for each other.

This is likely to bring some benefit to the iPhone 17 Air; I’d guess that Apple is paying even more attention than usual to its synthesis of software and hardware with this rumored all-new design.

So there you have it: two reasons why a small battery isn’t the end of the world for the rumored iPhone 17 Air. Be sure to let us know whether you’re looking forward to the iPhone 17 series in the comments below.

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The Florida Panthers repeated as Stanley Cup champions, becoming the NHL's first back-to-back winners since Tampa Bay in 2020 and '21 and the third team to do it this century.

(Image credit: Lynne Sladky)

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for June 18.

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Commentary: The Google Gemini features on my Samsung Galaxy let me be more spontaneous in my shopping adventures.

• Google’s Veo 3 Fast generates 720p AI videos twice as fast as standard
• Gemini Pro users can create three videos per day
• Flow Pro users pay just 20 credits per clip

There's a strawberry made of glass that someone is cutting like it's made of jelly, then the same thing happens to several other berries and the Pokémon Charizard. A woman dips tongs into a platter of molten rock and takes a bite of the apparently delicious treat before spreading some on a waffle and taking a bite.

These aren't a cough-syrup-induced hallucination; it's the latest trend in ASMR videos, created with Google's Veo 3 and other AI movie generators.

You might have seen these and other bizarre videos on your TikTok algorithm. I’m not the biggest proponent of ASMR videos and their gentle whisperers, rhythmic tapping, and other soporific audio, but I understood the appeal. I'm not so sure the AI version is just as good. These aren’t your traditional low-fi lo-fi tapping-and-brushing videos.

@softcrunchai

♬ original sound - SoftCrunchAI

Google Veo is definitely the most popular choice of AI video generators for ASMR. As good as the model is at producing realistic videos (for a given value of realism in this case), it still creates videos with a sheen of artificiality, lacking the errors and imprecision that are the hallmark of human-made ASMR.

Friends of mine who are much bigger fans of ASMR claim it's not just the sounds and voices that entice them. It's the intimacy and immediacy that they like. One said that the 'tingle triggers' are there in the AI videos, but it's just not the same.

AI ASMR @impossibleais

♬ green to blue (slowed + reverbed) - daniel.mp3

That's not a universal opinion, though. These videos rack up millions of views. The comments are full of both excitement and confusion, with people unable to explain why they like the videos, or who are amazed how they can't stop watching them.

Part of the appeal might be novelty. Anything new will have a fanbase at least for a little while, and Veo’s video quality is unlike anything most people have seen before. It mimics natural lighting, shadow, and realistic camera motion. Perfect glass statues of Pokémon that can be cut in half with ease, because they're all AI-generated, are an eye-catcher for sure.

As fun as it is, I wonder if anyone seeking a pure ASMR experience will choose an AI video. The sounds may scratch that auditory itch, but I wonder how many lists of favorite ASMR videos will include them.

Not every AI trend has to make sense. Some of them very much don't. AI ASMR may have a niche place in the overall ASMR ecosystem. Still, I don't think the majority of people who fall asleep to sweet whispers will prefer the sound of simulated glass crunching under an invisible knife.

@impossibleais

♬ September - slowed + reverb - Wallerstedt You might also like

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• Meta AI prompts you to choose to post publicly in the app's Discovery feed by default
• Meta has a new warning pop-up, but accidental sharing remains a possibility
• You can opt out of having your conversations go public entirely through the Meta AI app’s settings

The Meta AI app's somewhat unique contribution to the AI chatbot app space is the Discovery feed, which allows people to show off the interesting things they are doing with the AI assistant.

However, it turns out that many people were unaware that they weren't just posting those prompts and conversation snippets for themselves or their friends to see. When you tap "Share" and "Post to feed," you're sharing those chats with everyone, much like a public Facebook post.

The Discovery feed is an oddity in some ways, a graft of the AI chatbot experience on a more classic social media structure. You’ll find AI-generated images of surprisingly human robots, terribly designed inspirational quote images, and more than a few examples of the kind of prompts the average person does not want just anyone seeing.

I've scrolled past people asking Meta AI to explain their anxiety dreams, draft eulogies, and brainstorm wedding proposals. It's voyeuristic, and not in the performative way of most social media; it's real and personal.

It seems that many people assumed sharing those posts was more like saving them for later perusal, rather than offering the world a peek at whatever awkward experiments with the AI you are conducting. Meta has hastily added a new pop-up warning to the process, making it clear that anything you post is public, visible to everyone, and may even appear elsewhere on Meta platforms.

If that warning doesn't seem enough to ensure your AI privacy on the app, you can opt out of the Discovery feed completely. Here's how to ensure your chats aren’t one accidental tap away from public display.

(Image credit: Meta AI screenshot)

• Open the Meta AI app.
• Tap your profile picture or initials, whichever represents your digital self.
• Tap on "Data and Privacy" and "Manage Your Information."
• Tao on "Make all public prompts visible to only you," and then "Apply to all" in the pop-up. This will ensure that when you share a prompt, only you will be able to see it.
• If that doesn't seem like enough, you can completely erase the record of any interaction you've had with Meta AI by tapping "Delete all prompts." That includes any prompt you've written, regardless of whether it's been posted, so be certain.

Private prompts

Of course, even with the opt-out enabled and your conversations with Meta AI no longer public, Meta still retains the right to use your chats to improve its models.

It's common among all the big AI providers. That's supposedly anonymized and doesn't involve essentially publishing your private messages, but theoretically, what you and Meta AI say to each other could appear in a chat with someone else entirely in some form.

It's a paradox in that the more data AI models have, the better they perform, but people are reluctant to share too much with an algorithm. There was a minor furor when, for a brief period, ChatGPT conversations became visible to other users under certain conditions. It's the other edge of the ubiquitous “we may use your data to improve our systems” statement in every terms of service.

Meta’s Discovery feed simply removes the mask, inviting you to post and making it easy for others to see. AI systems are evolving faster than our understanding of them, hence the constant drumbeat about transparency. The idea is that the average user, unaware of the hidden complexities of AI, should be informed of how their data is being saved and used.

However, given how most companies typically address these kinds of issues, Meta is likely to stick to its strategy of fine-tuning its privacy options in response to user outcry. And maybe remember that if you’re going to tell your deepest dreams to an AI chatbot, make sure it’s not going to share the details with the world.

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• The Trump Organization says a new T1 Phone will launch in August
• It will apparently be "designed and built in the United States"
• But experts say the phone is more likely to have Chinese origins

The Trump Mobile T1 Phone is undoubtedly one of the strangest phones ever made, mixing odd specs (a 3.5mm headphone jack) with ones that make no sense ("5000mAh long life camera"). However, it also comes with a big claim that it'll be "designed and built in the United States."

Given that analysts recently told us that "the idea of making iPhones in the US is a stretch", is this really possible? Or will the manufacturing reality of the "sleek, gold smartphone" be a bit more complicated?

We asked smartphone supply chain experts for their verdict on the Trump Mobile T1 and whether it really can meet those lofty "made in the USA" goals.

With the T1 arriving in August for $499, it could theoretically steal some thunder from the rumored iPhone 17 – but there are good reasons to suspect that Apple won't be losing any sleep over its unexpected, gold-colored rival from Trump Mobile...

The claim

The Trump Organization has made some typically bold claims about the T1 – it's been billed as the phone that will spark a new era in US phone manufacturing.

In a press release, the Trump family business stated that the T1 is "proudly designed and built in the United States for customers who expect the best from their mobile carrier". Elsewhere, the site claims it has been "built for patriots by patriots".

(Image credit: The Trump Organization)

Expanding on the claims, Eric Trump stated on "The Benny Show" podcast that "eventually, all the phones can be built in the United States of America".

Yet the Trump Mobile site is short on specific details about how and where the Trump T1 phone will be made. According to experts, there are good reasons to suspect that this will be ambitious at best...

The reality

(Image credit: The Trump Organization)

• Experts agree the Trump phone won't meet its "made in the USA" claims
• It will likely be a modified Android phone from a Chinese manufacturer
• But the Trump Mobile T1 could theoretically still be assembled in the USA

The Trump Mobile T1 won't meet the strict definition of "made in the USA" for a few reasons, experts say – and these also explain why moving iPhone manufacturing to the USA is unlikely in the near future.

Firstly, "made in the USA" has a high bar. Professor Tinglong Dai, who teaches at the Johns Hopkins University Carey Business School, told us: "The FTC [Federal Trade Commission] has a strict standard for “Made in USA”: all or almost all parts and processing must be domestic. Judging by that standard, the claim is unrealistic."

But there could be ways around that. "The Trump Organization’s “built in America” language isn’t an official designation, so there’s plenty of wiggle room for them to make that claim," Dai added.

Ben Hatton, market analyst at CCS Insight, agrees. "Our expectation is that the T1 Phone will work around this by virtue of assembly in the US using parts from elsewhere," he told us.

On that subject, TechRadar's Editor at Large, Lance Ulanoff, also noted: "There's just one company that builds phones in the US, Purism. Its specs don't match up. Even if it is assembled somewhere in Trump Castle, they're still almost certainly sourcing components outside the US."

So, what phone will the T1 be based on? That's still something of a mystery. "The phone will probably be a custom-modified Android smartphone from a Chinese manufacturer," Ben Hatton from CCS Insight told us. That seems highly likely – we tried putting the T1's specs into GSMArena's phone finder for existing phones, and it came up blank.

Why can't phones be made in the USA?

(Image credit: ArcGIS StoryMaps)

So what does all this mean for the grand ambition of manufacturing phones in the US? And why isn't it possible?

"The main challenge is that we don’t have an end-to-end tech supply chain, and the U.S. lacks the manufacturing capacity for several key components. Even if we do, the lack of skilled workers would be a main bottleneck," Dai explained.

Ben Hatton from CCS Insight agrees that a true "made in the USA" phone is unlikely to happen for a long time, if ever. "The US is unlikely to have enough labor with the right skills for this to be achievable in anything other than the long-term. The costs of labor would then go through the roof due to this skills shortage," he added.

"Upending 50 years of supply-chain evolution by making companies move facilities would also mean totally reshaping these chains by making the US the ‘focal point’ rather than China," he concluded. In other words, it's completely unrealistic and not compatible with the complexities of smartphones or our globalized tech world.

To sum that up, Professor Tinglong Dai concluded: "A bigger issue is that there’s really no such thing as a fully domestic supply chain.” You may have read the classical essay, “I, Pencil” – even for something as simple as a pencil, you’re talking about dozens of countries behind it, and that’s before the current global supply chain era," he noted.

To see the equivalent for an iPhone, check out the excellent 'Mapping the iPhone' infographic from ArcGIS StoryMaps, which shows just how complex smartphone supply chains are.

So while The Trump Mobile T1 may carry the "made in the USA" boast, experts agree it'll be at best "assembled in the USA" – and even that hasn't yet been officially confirmed ahead of its August launch.

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• Asus RTX 5080 now doubles as AI hardware and a surprisingly cool SSD bay
• PCIe lanes aren’t just for GPUs anymore, thanks to Asus’ hybrid hardware approach
• Asus is developing Multi-LM so AI devs can offload models straight to onboard SSDs

The unusual GeForce RTX 5080 GPU, first spotted a few weeks ago with an SSD slot, is no longer just a hardware oddity.

Asus North America has now confirmed the ProArt RTX 5080 SSD Edition is a real product.

As unusual as it may sound, the decision to pair high-performance graphics processing with solid-state storage is part of a broader plan involving artificial intelligence and local model development.

A hybrid GPU-storage design targeting AI development

Despite Asus remaining tight-lipped on a release date and shipping configuration, some technical details have begun to emerge, alongside a few unanswered questions.

One of the biggest surprises is the 90-degree rotated GPU layout - Asus modified the printed circuit board (PCB) design so that the GPU is mounted perpendicular to the usual orientation.

This is not a configuration found in any other RTX 5080 models, suggesting a custom approach that accommodates the SSD and improves airflow.

Asus claims this layout helps the SSD benefit from, “airflow provided by the card’s fans,” although the SSD is not in direct contact with the main heatsink.

It is instead cooled via a secondary heatsink and passive airflow, reportedly keeping the SSD about 10 degrees Celsius cooler than a typical M.2 drive mounted on a motherboard.

The SSD integration also exploits PCIe bifurcation, meaning unused PCI Express lanes are reassigned to support the drive.

The company has previously applied this approach to RTX 4060 series cards, which did not fully saturate the PCIe interface, leaving enough bandwidth for an M.2 slot.

Now, with the RTX 5080 ProArt edition, the idea is refined to suit high-end AI workflows, although it introduces trade-offs, the GPU may not always have access to all PCIe lanes, potentially limiting peak performance under certain workloads.

Perhaps the most significant revelation lies in Asus’ software ambitions - the company is developing a tool called Multi-LM, intended for developers working with large language models.

Asus says, this tool will “allow AI developers to offload models directly to the storage, potentially enabling local model development without needing constant memory swaps to slower system drives.”

This will be of interest to those looking for the best LLM for coding, and positions the RTX 5080 SSD Edition as more than just a gaming card; it could become one of the best AI tools for local inference and prototyping.

Asus has only released a single render of the card and has not confirmed performance metrics or availability.

The question of whether this concept delivers meaningful real-world gains or just adds complexity remains unanswered.

Via Videocardz

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Look, I get it: there’s not much else more special in the gaming or tech world than the smell of a new console freshly unboxed.

Add in that the new console of the moment is the Nintendo Switch 2, and with it all the promise of new exclusive games and hours, days, nights spent in Mario Kart World, and it’s not surprising that tracking down new stock of the Nintendo Switch 2 isn’t easy.

But I’m not fussed.

Well, okay, I’m a little fussed; I have a decent dose of FOMO tickling my gaming synapse as I see others on social media with their box-fresh Switch 2 consoles, while I remain flopped on my sofa with my aged original Nintendo Switch.

However, I’ve resisted the urge to splurge my hard-earned cash on the Switch 2. In part because I’m probably one of the few people who doesn’t get all giddy at Mario Kart (at least not since Mario Kart 64). On the other hand, there’s not yet a glut of big new first-party exclusive games for the console.

Yet my big reason to wait is all about bundles.

The wating game

(Image credit: Future)

Alongside looking after the phones and tablets vertical at TechRadar, I also manage the site’s deals team, so I spend a good bit of time tracking sales events and chewing over deals from the likes of Amazon, Best Buy, Currys, Argos, Walmart and more.

While I don’t expect the Switch 2 to drop in price in the next couple of years, let alone anytime soon, I think we could see some compelling Switch 2 bundles as the inevitable march towards the winter (at least in the Northern Hemisphere) holiday season.

With said season comes an Amazon October sales spree and Black Friday, which is far less of a day of sales and more like weeks of bargains for the discerning shopper to pursue. And a good suite of those deals falls on games and gaming hardware.

So I’m forecasting that come November time we’ll see more varied Nintendo Switch 2 bundles, specifically from major retailers; I doubt these will add up to a discounted Switch 2, but instead could bundle the console with a new game or two, or a Switch 2 Pro controller, all at a price that's notably cheaper than buying each part separately.

I’m calling it now: there’ll be a Donkey Kong Bananza Switch 2 bundle.

As such, I think I’ll kick my FOMO to the curb for now and hold out for a handful of months before I seek out the new Switch.

I have previous form on this, as I remember holding out for an original Switch bundle, which I snapped up during the Black Friday period of 2017. I think this snagged me the console and Super Mario Odyssey for a decent price, leaving me with some change to snap up Breath of the Wild; don’t ask me for specifics as we’re talking the best part of a decade ago, though.

Now the gaming landscape has changed a little in that time, with the likes of the PS5 and Xbox Series X even increasing in price as they age. So compelling console bundles might be a thing of the past.

Yet I’m willing to cling to hope and wait for a Switch 2 bundle that catches my eye. If nothing else, there should be more exclusive games for the new console as 2025 marches on.

In the meantime, I’ll take the money I could have splurged on the Switch 2 and see if I can get any gaming bargains in the early Prime Day deals; wish me luck, or come and join me.

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• GL.iNet Flint 3 is a powerful Wi-Fi 7 router with 2.5GbE ports at a bargain early bird price
• Supports OpenWrt, VPNs, and mesh with wide plugin compatibility
• It's the follow-up to the Slate 7, the world's first mobile Wi-Fi 7 router

The GL.iNet Flint 3 (GL-BE9300) may be the cheapest Wi-Fi 7 BE9300 router currently available, and with four 2.5GbE LAN ports plus VPN support, it could be a no-brainer for buyers looking to take advantage of Wi-Fi 7 speeds on a budget.

The tri-band router, designed for home users and small offices, is available for pre-order now. Super early bird buyers had the chance to grab it for just $119, but that tier quickly sold out. Early bird pricing is set at $139, while the standard pre-order price is $159. The MSRP is listed at $229.90, with orders expected to ship in mid-July 2025.

The Flint 3 builds on GL.iNet’s more compact, travel-oriented Slate 7, which the company launched a few months ago priced from $120.

Solid VPN performance

The Flint 3 is powered by a 1.5GHz quad-core Qualcomm processor, probably the IPQ5332, and paired with 1GB of DDR4 RAM and 8GB of eMMC storage.

It runs a customized version of OpenWrt 23.05 (Linux 5.4.213) and includes GL.iNet’s Admin Panel v4.7. The OS supports over 5,000 plug-ins, with built-in tools for privacy, tunneling, and ad blocking.

On the networking side, the Flint 3 is fitted with five 2.5Gbps Ethernet ports, one for WAN, one WAN/LAN, and three dedicated LAN ports. These support up to 10Gbps link aggregation.

It supports WiFi 7 across the 2.4GHz (688Mbps), 5GHz (2882Mbps), and 6GHz (5765Mbps) bands, and includes four foldable external antennas. A USB 3.0 port allows for smartphone tethering or use with a cellular dongle.

The router’s VPN performance is rated up to 680Mbps on both WireGuard and OpenVPN-DCO. This is slightly below the 900Mbps seen on the older Flint 2, but still solid for encrypted traffic.

It also includes features like AdGuard Home, failover support, load balancing, and mesh networking. Power is provided via a 12V/4A DC input, and power draw is listed as under 25W under normal load.

Compared to more expensive BE9300 routers on the market, Flint 3’s early pricing and hardware mix make it a standout. Competing with similarly priced routers like the TP-Link Archer BE550 may be tough at full MSRP, but right now, it’s among the best WiFi 7 deals available.

Via CNX Software

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• Solidigm’s 122.88TB SSD may not be the fastest, but it wins on density and design
• At $12,400, this SSD isn’t cheap, but it could slash rack space and energy waste
• Solidigm already has rivals with competing 122.88TB SSD products

With a staggering capacity of 122.88TB, the Solidigm D5-P5336 currently holds the title for the world’s largest SSD.

Launched in late 2024, it became available for purchase at $12,400, a figure which may seem steep, until one considers the operational cost savings from reducing physical rack space and energy usage.

As Solidigm aims to lead the market in high-capacity enterprise storage, the company may soon face competition, not just in performance, but in scale.

A 246TB SSD may arrive in 2025

Reports now suggest that a 246TB SSD could be introduced before the end of 2025, potentially doubling today’s storage ceiling.

Solidigm’s drive has been positioned as a density-first product, with read speeds up to 7GB/s and write speeds of 3GB/s via PCIe Gen4.

It is optimized for workloads that benefit from high sequential read performance, such as AI pipelines, CDN services, and object storage.

Solidigm’s D5-P5336 122.88TB SSD packs a decent capacity into a single U.2 drive and sets a new benchmark in SSD storage density.

Yet despite the scale, real-world benchmarks indicate that performance doesn't scale linearly.

It often matches or slightly trails its 61.44TB predecessor in high-concurrency workloads, and lags behind Gen5 drives like Micron’s 61TB 6550, particularly in write-heavy operations.

The 122.88TB model offers modest endurance at 0.6 DWPD, which equates to 134.3 PB written over its five-year warranty period.

That makes it a fit for read-heavy environments, but less ideal for mixed or write-intensive deployments.

Still, Solidigm’s strategy is clear: focus on maximizing storage per watt, per rack unit, and per dollar.

As such, this drive may not be the best SSD in raw performance terms, but it plays a critical role in modern data centers where density and efficiency drive infrastructure design.

The competitive landscape is also shifting, and little-known Chinese brand DapuStor has released its own 122.88TB SSD, joining the race toward high-capacity flash.

While details on its long-term reliability and support remain limited, this signals growing interest in ultra-dense enterprise SSDs beyond established players.

That said, the possibility of a 246TB SSD raises important questions. Can NAND technology and controller efficiency keep up with this growth?

And will such capacity jumps continue to deliver meaningful performance improvements?

As data centers brace for AI-driven demand, the answer may define not only the best external SSD for hyperscalers but the trajectory of the largest SSD and hard drive technologies overall.

Via StorageReview

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