Review: Dyson V8 Absolute Cordless vacuum

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

Dyson’s addressed the biggest issues with cordless vacuums, which is the battery life (the Absolute runs 40 minutes on a full charge), loudness (it is 50 per cent quieter) while it improved the performance (the digital motor V8 runs at 425W, compared to the previous generation V6 motor’s 350W). 

Cordless vacuums are promoted as being compact, versatile and convenient but usually at the expense of performance. Battery powered vacuums, after all, run at a fraction of the power of larger plug-in type vacuums and their more portable size means their motors are smaller and less powerful. 

That might be true for most run of the mill cordless vacuums but with Dyson’s V8 Absolute Cordless vacuum turns these outdated ideas on their head. 

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Nextbit's Robin is discounted to CAD $389.00 on Amazon.ca

Here's a deal for anyone looking for something unique in the smartphone space. The Nextbit Robin is discounted for Amazon Prime Canada subscribers and now costs $389.00 for the  32GB version. This is an innovative 5.2-inch smartphone that brings the tightest cloud integration thanks to a persistent connection to 100 GB of online storage. The deal takes off $110.00 from the Robin's retail price.

Cisco to lay off at least 5,500 employees

Photo courtesy of Sky News

Networking equipment company Cisco is making the shift from hardware to software and with it they’ll be losing seven percent of their workforce or at least 5,500 employees. There will be 70,000 employees remaining after the job cuts happen during the first fiscal quarter of 2017. The company made the announcement during its fourth-quarter earnings call on Wednesday afternoon. The layoffs could’ve been worse though as earlier claims said Cisco was supposedly going to let go as many as 14,000 employees.

Sales for the company grew two percent year-over-year (excluding a video unit) to US$12.6 billion during a quarter. Its stock was down 1.3 percent on Wednesday. It’s still going to be challenging for Cisco going forward as product or hardware make up almost half the company’s sales and three-fourths of its revenue in the last quarter. Meanwhile, its security business—which is its fastest growing segment—still represents four percent of its sales. It’s up 16 percent year-over-year or was worth $540 million during the quarter.

Source: Recode + Mashable

Microsoft’s new Surface ad hits back at the Apple iPad Pro’s computer claims

The Microsoft vs. Apple debate has been going on for as long as we can remember. So, when Apple market the iPad Pro claiming it’s a full computer, it was almost certain Microsoft wouldn’t take that lying down. True enough, a new Surface ad has surfaced mocking the full computer claims of the iPad Pro. This time they have Siri and Cortana talking to each other with Siri saying, “I just got a keyboard. I’m a computer now, like you.” Cortana fires back by talking about how the Surface Pro 4 tablets have trackpads, full desktop versions of apps, external ports, and an Intel Core i7 processor.  And ends the commercial with “Surface does more, just like you.” We’re pretty sure we’re not hearing the end of this.