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The Sage Luxe Brewer Thermal is an advanced drip coffee machine that launched earlier this year and is a new version of the original Luxe Brewer with an insulated carafe to keep your freshly brewed coffee hot for up to four hours. I'm currently testing it to find out whether it can earn a place in TechRadar's list of the best coffee makers, but I wanted to bring you a few of my first impressions.
The designers at Sage (known as Breville outside the UK) clearly realize that first impressions matter, and not only does the Luxe Brewer Thermal look smart with its smooth lines and silver finish, it also has a surprisingly small footprint. With a base measuring 14.7 x 7 inches, 37.24 x 17.7cm, it's about as small as a full-size drip machine can be.
Something else I particularly like about the Luxe Brewer Thermal is that its water tank is removable – a feature that makes it much easier to fill and clean than most drip machines. The tank also has a wide opening, making it easy to fill from a tap, and is supplied with a water filter complete with a counter so you can see when it's time for a replacement.
The tank has a small handle, which you can loop a finger through to keep it steady, but you'll need to support the tank with your other hand underneath the body of the tank once it's full. A larger, thicker handle that you could get your whole hand around would make it easier to carry, but since you already have big handles for the basket and the pitcher on the right-hand side, I can understand the designers not wanting to add yet another on the left.
The water tank is removable, but its small handle means you'll need two hands to carry it when it's full (Image credit: Sage)The Luxe Brewer Thermal has options for both hot and cold brewing. I've not yet experimented with the cold option (though with warm weather approaching, I plan to do so very soon), but my first results with the hot mode were excellent.
The instruction manual includes a table explaining the optimum weight of coffee and quantity of water to use, depending on how many cups you want to brew. Helpfully, the coffee measurements are provided in both grams and scoops. I have an electronic scale for weighing coffee, but if you don't, there's a long-handled scoop included with the machine, so it's not a problem.
Time to brewI'm trying to avoid drinking too much coffee in the evenings (not always easy when you test coffee machines for a living), so I was particularly keen to try the Luxe Brewer Thermals' delayed start function. A jug full of freshly brewed filter coffee is the perfect way to start the morning, in my opinion.
Setting the timer on the machine is very simple – just tap the button, turn the dial to set the time you want to start brewing, and press it in to confirm. The set time will appear on the display, and you can head to bed.
(Image credit: Sage)I didn't hear the Luxe Thermal Brewer at all when it started working at 7am, and when I entered the kitchen half an hour later, I thought it might not have worked because the outside of the carafe was so cold, but that was just the result of its excellent insulating properties. It was full of perfectly brewed, piping hot coffee, ready to be enjoyed.
I've yet to test just how long the Luxe Thermal Brewer's pitcher can keep drinks hot, but so far it seems to perform better than the Fellow Aiden Precision Coffee Maker, whose jug became noticeably warm on the outside and soon allowed drinks to become lukewarm.
Overall, an excellent experience. So far, the only drawback was that the instruction manual seems to be written for a global audience and mostly uses Ikea-style diagrams, which aren't always completely self-explanatory. Thankfully, Sage's website contains a much more detailed user guide, which covers all the machine's features in much more depth.
I'm looking forward to putting the rest of its features to the test very soon, and finding out whether it can earn a place in my complete roundup of the best drop coffee makers. Watch this space.
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Buying one of the best student laptops isn’t always easy, especially if you’re eyeing up one of Apple’s MacBooks and are working to a tight budget. MacBooks are some of the most expensive laptops out there, and while they’re packed with features and practically last forever, your finances can still take a hit.
Apple offers student discounts across its range of products, yet these aren’t the most generous offers you’ll see. But what if I told you there’s another way to get a cheap MacBook without compromising on quality or buying from a dodgy third-party website? In fact, you can score a top-quality MacBook directly from Apple while saving hundreds in the process.
I can vouch for this method, too, as I’ve done it myself and am still pleased with what I got years later. Try it out yourself, and you’ll get an excellent new Mac for college without breaking the bank.
Apple’s education store(Image credit: Apple)The most conventional way to get one of the best MacBooks for college is to use Apple’s education website. This houses various deals for students on devices like Macs and iPads, and Apple often throws in free extras (like a pair of AirPods or an Apple Pencil) when you buy through this store.
The problem is that the deals you’ll find there aren’t always that attractive. Most Macs only come with $100 off – the MacBook Air is priced at $899 through Apple’s education storefront, as opposed to its regular $999 price, for example. A 10% discount is fine, but not earth-shattering.
If you’re in the market for an Apple device and were planning on buying one of the accessories that the company bundles in for free anyway, it’s worth a look. For instance, if you were going to get a MacBook and a new Magic Mouse, you can get the latter for free from Apple, which is a great deal. But these offers don’t last forever, and if you can’t get one – or would rather save even more money on a laptop than have an accessory you don’t need – there’s another place you should be looking.
Don’t get me wrong, any saving is welcome, and you’d do far worse than to accept the $100 off that Apple’s education store provides. But I know we can do better than that.
The refurbished alternative(Image credit: Farknot Architect / Shutterstock)Enter Apple's Certified Refurbished store. There, you’ll find a whole host of Apple products that have been returned by previous customers, fitted up and repaired by Apple, then sold on at a steep discount.
I know what you’re thinking: why would you buy a refurbished product when you can get a brand-new one from Apple? Aren’t refurbished ones full of dents, scuffs, and other problems?
That might be the case when you buy from third-party refurbished stores, but not from Apple. Apple’s refurbishment process is rigorous: the company cleans, tests, and inspects each device, replaces any faulty parts with genuine replacement components, and ships it to you for free in a new box with new cables and accessories. You get a one-year warranty, too, with the option to insure your device with AppleCare.
I bought a MacBook Pro with the M1 Pro chip from Apple’s refurbished store a few years ago. When it arrived, I simply wouldn’t have believed that it wasn’t a new laptop: from the new, sealed box to the spotless body without a scratch on it, nothing indicated that this was anything other than a brand-new product.
Discounts on discounts(Image credit: Apple)With the refurbished route, the real kicker is the price. While Apple’s education store is selling the entry-level M4 MacBook Air for $899, you can get the same device on the refurbished store for the even lower price of $849. Saving even more money for something that is essentially indistinguishable from a new MacBook seems like a no-brainer.
Sure, you might be able to find a Mac even cheaper by scouring eBay or Facebook Marketplace, but you won’t get anywhere near the same quality, and certainly not the same warranty.
The only caveat with the refurbished store is that some websites discount new Macs to similar prices to what Apple offers, so it’s often worth checking major retailers from time to time to see how they match up. If you can get a brand-new MacBook for less than one of Apple’s refurbished ones, that’s naturally the better option.
But if you just need something right now and want to score a discount without having to sacrifice your peace of mind, Apple’s refurbished store is a great place to look. It could leave you with a top-quality laptop for college and a little more change in your pocket, too.
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- Apple just unveiled AppleCare One, and it offers two key upgrades that might just save you some money
- A massive 28,000mAh battery makes the FOSSiBOT F107 Pro feel more like a rugged tablet
- FOSSiBOT F107 Pro blends 200MP photography with bulk, weight, and questionable image processing
- Starlight Night Vision from the F107 Pro could work, but only under ideal outdoor conditions
Night vision in smartphones has long been synonymous with grainy black-and-white images, often requiring infrared lighting to function.
The FOSSiBOT F107 Pro claims to challenge this status quo with what it calls “Starlight Night Vision,” a technology which promises full-color visibility in near-total darkness.
The core of the F107 Pro’s pitch lies in its ability to capture full-color imagery in lighting conditions as low as 0.0005 lux.
Color night vision at near-total darkness levelsFor comparison, this device can capture decent images in an environment that's darker than a moonless night in the wilderness.
This feat is supposedly achieved through a large-aperture lens and an ultra-sensitive sensor that uses ambient light sources like stars and scattered moonlight.
If it works as advertised, it could be valuable for field professionals or extreme outdoor users.
But it’s worth asking how often such perfect low-light conditions align in real-world use, and whether typical users will experience the kind of visual clarity the device showcases in marketing materials.
In terms of photography specs, the rugged smartphone certainly doesn’t hold back.
A 200MP main camera and a 50MP wide-angle macro lens make for an ambitious setup, while a 32MP front camera rounds things out for video calls or vlogging.
Although large sensor numbers don’t always guarantee image quality, processing software and lens quality play a crucial role too.
And with rugged phones, camera optimization is often where manufacturers cut corners in favor of durability.
On the performance side, the F107 Pro runs on MediaTek’s Dimensity 7300 5G processor and boasts up to 30GB RAM (with virtual memory expansion) and 512GB of onboard storage, expandable to 2TB.
That’s enough power to multitask, store extensive media files, or run demanding business smartphone applications.
The phone also carries a massive 28,000mAh battery, which seems more aligned with rugged tablet territory.
While impressive, this also means a heavier, bulkier device, which everyday users may find less convenient.
This device is physically resilient, and it is built to survive drops, dust, water, and temperature extremes with MIL-STD-810H certification and IP68/IP69K ratings.
The F107 Pro may not replace a flagship for casual users, but it’s certainly built to compete in the niche market of field-ready devices.
Via Androidpc
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- Lost yield from stochastics is costing chipmakers billions at advanced process nodes
- Current process control methods are not enough to solve high-volume stochastics failures
- New whitepaper outlines design and measurement solutions to close stochastics gap
A new whitepaper has claimed the semiconductor industry is losing billions of dollars due to something few outside the field have heard of: stochastic variability.
This form of random patterning variation is now considered the biggest hurdle to achieving high yields at the most advanced process nodes.
The paper was contributed by Austin, Texas-based Fractilia, whose CTO, Chris Mack, noted, “Stochastic variability is contributing to multibillion-dollar delays in introducing advanced process technology into high volume manufacturing.”
Affecting yield, performance and reliabilityMack further explained current process control strategies have not been able to address these random effects.
“Closing the stochastics gap requires completely different methodologies that device makers need to validate and adopt,” Mack said.
Fractilia defines this “stochastics gap” as the difference between what can be patterned in research and what can be reliably mass-produced at acceptable yields.
At the heart of this gap is a randomness rooted in the physics of materials, molecules, and light sources used in chip production.
Although these effects were once negligible, they now consume a growing share of the manufacturing error budget.
“We have seen our customers make dense features as small as 12 nanometers in research and development,” Mack said. “But when they try to move it into manufacturing, stochastic failures are affecting their ability to achieve acceptable yield, performance and reliability.”
The problem has grown alongside the rise of EUV and high-NA EUV lithography. These advances have allowed chipmakers to attempt even smaller features, but also made them more vulnerable to stochastic defects.
Unlike conventional variability, this type can’t be eliminated with tighter controls, it needs to be managed with probability-based design and measurement techniques.
“The stochastics gap is an industry-wide problem,” Mack said. “This issue can be minimized and controlled, but it all starts with accurate stochastics measurement technology.”
The whitepaper, which you can download here, includes an analysis of the problem and proposes stochastics-aware design, materials innovation, and updated process controls as the path forward.
You might also likeSamsung’s 61.44TB BM1743, its highest-capacity SSD to date, typically sells for $7,500, but it's currently listed on ServerSupply for $5,950, but with available discounts the final price drops to $5,593.
This brings the cost to under $0.09 per gigabyte, making it one of the best $/GB values in the ultra-high-capacity PCIe Gen5 category.
The drive is a 2.5-inch U.2 model built for read-intensive workloads. It features a PCIe 5.0 x4 NVMe interface, QLC V-NAND flash, and high sustained throughput.
Add an adapterRead speeds top out at 14,200MBps, with write speeds reaching 2,100MBps.
Random performance peaks at 850,000 IOPS for reads and 30,000 IOPS for writes. Latency is 150 microseconds for reads and 30 microseconds for writes.
It’s rated for 0.26 drive writes per day and supports 29,153TB of total endurance.
Features include TCG Opal 2.0 encryption, AES-XTS 256-bit hardware encryption, enhanced power-loss protection, and full end-to-end data path integrity.
The SSD also includes static and dynamic wear leveling, plus support for advanced S.M.A.R.T. monitoring.
Power requirements are high. Read operations draw 23.8 watts, writes consume 24.7 watts, and idle power use is listed at 5 watts.
Despite being designed for enterprise systems, the BM1743 can be used with standard PCs and laptops via a USB adapter, making it a good choice for power users, creators, and developers (with pretty deep pockets) who need large, fast storage without building a server.
Products like the Sabrent EC-U2SA allow users to connect U.2 SSDs over USB 3.2. This adapter includes a 12V/2A power supply to handle high draw, supports TRIM and UASP, and works with both Windows and macOS.
The adapter is currently available to buy on Amazon for $34.99, down from its usual $59.99.
The SSD’s listed price on ServerSupply is $5,950, but a 5% discount is automatically applied at checkout and an additional 1% is available when using the retailer’s mobile app, bringing the final price to $5,593.
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- Ryzen Threadripper Pro 9995WX now on sale with Zen 5, 96 cores, 192 threads
- AMD’s most powerful workstation CPU available from major retailers for $11,699
- Most professionals won’t need the 9995WX despite the impressive specs
The AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 9995WX is now available to buy from major retailers, including Amazon and Newegg, with a starting price of $11,699 - much cheaper than initial predictions.
It’s the top chip in AMD’s new Threadripper Pro 9000 WX-series and is built on the latest Zen 5 architecture, sporting 96 cores, 192 threads, and offers a boost clock of up to 5.4GHz.
The 9995WX uses TSMC’s 4nm process and fits the sTR5 socket. The CPU supports 8-channel DDR5-6400 memory, offers up to 148 PCIe lanes, and carries a 350W TDP.
For professional workloadsThis processor is aimed at professional workloads that can scale across dozens of threads.
AMD lists compatibility with chipsets like Pro 695, TRX50, and WRX90.
The chip also supports ECC memory and includes features like AMD Pro technologies and EXPO for memory tuning.
For those running highly parallel tasks like visual effects rendering or scientific modeling, this processor can deliver impressive throughput, but at this price, it’s hard to recommend unless the application is truly pushing the limits of core count.
While AMD’s new CPU can deliver unmatched multi-threaded performance in the right environment, most professionals will likely find better value in AMD's lower-tier options (the EPYC 9655 matches Threadripper PRO 9995WX core count for less than half the price) or in Intel's workstation CPUs, depending on their specific use case.
With no integrated graphics, a discrete GPU is required. Cooling is also left to the buyer, as no cooler is bundled.
Unless you're operating in a niche that truly benefits from 96 cores, it’s unlikely to be the best choice or offer the best value for most users.
Buyers in the UK can, as always, expect to pay slightly more than their American counterparts. Novatech is currently selling the new chip there for £10,510, or around $14,205.
You may also likeAI agents, the much-touted next phase of generative AI, have commanded enterprises’ attention. Right now, 61% of business leaders are actively adopting AI agents, according to a recent survey by my organization – with ambitious plans to scale them organization-wide.
The fixation is justified: agents can work autonomously, navigate complex workflows, learn from experience, and leverage other software as tools. They are a step change from AI that talks with you, like chatbots, to AI that works for you. The result is major productivity: Gartner estimates that by 2028, agents will automate 15% of day-to-day business decisions.
But business leaders shouldn’t mistake agents’ sophistication with omnipotence. Agents can fall into the same traps as older, less sophisticated software – including dreaded IT silos.
Battling silosFor decades, IT professionals have battled silos: applications, databases, and other systems that aren't interoperable. In the 1980s and 1990s, enterprises struggled to connect disparate applications into a single ERP solution.
Accounting, procurement, and sales workstreams were stubbornly separate – squandering coveted cross-company insights. More recently, enterprises have struggled to unify crucial customer data across disparate CRMs, and have also labored to integrate data spread across on-premise locations and multiple cloud environments.
No matter the decade or technology, the result of silos is always the same: wasted time, wasted resources, and wasted potential. When agents become trapped in silos, the outcome is no different. Their return on investment plummets, too.
We are already seeing agentic silos take shape. Enterprises are using agents with rigid divisions – one agent for sales activities, another for procurement tasks, a third for CRMs – with little connective tissue between them. What if those agents need to work together to troubleshoot a complex problem, like a sudden and unexpected shift in product demand?
If they’re siloed, they cannot pool their abilities and function as a whole greater than the sum of their parts. Not orchestrating agents is like hiring several subcontractors to build a house but restricting their tools and communication. The result is a poorly built house – or jumble of agents with poor performance.
Agents and silosAgents can also be siloed from the technology that enterprises already have in place. Imagine an HR Agent tasked with orchestrating employee PTO – but unable to access certain calendar applications and documents.
Imagine an IT Agent tasked with troubleshooting software problems – but unable to access troves of past incident reports and help desk tickets. These agents would fail to complete their fundamental tasks, and the time and resources that went into building them would be wasted.
There is something deeply ironic about siloed agents. Agents' value lies in their very ability to traverse the full enterprise stack, bridging tools and processes that require human time and talent. When agents get stuck, they are a victim of the very problem they are trying to solve. Businesses are investing in the problem, not the solution.
Siloed agents have an additional pitfall: they need to be governed and secured piecemeal. Relying on an ad hoc, patchwork approach to governance and security means an agentic use case is likely to fall through the cracks. If this occurs, agents’ most valuable asset – their autonomy – can quickly turn into a liability. Issues like bias, drift, and security vulnerabilities are amplified by agents’ access and independence.
Reaching potentialFor agents to reach their full potential, business leaders must first fix the fragmentation underneath. Enterprises need a single data fabric that can unify the structured and unstructured data that powers agents. While many enterprises haven’t achieved this yet, a growing number understand the value: 72% of leaders view their organization’s proprietary data as key to unlocking the value of generative AI, according to my company’s most recent CEO Study.
Enterprises also need a hybrid control plane automating the sprawling landscape agents work across, unifying APIs, apps, events, files, and mainframe data. And enterprises should invest in a central nervous system for their agents. The future is multi-agent: It will be teams of agents, rather than a single agent, that tackle complex tasks. Enterprises need a single hub to supervise and route those agents. In other words, enterprises need a general contractor for all those subcontractors.
The need for orchestrationBetter integrated and orchestrated agents also boost observability. Rather than governing and securing agents piecemeal, enterprises can apply comprehensive rules and oversight from a single point. This also allows AI security teams and AI governance teams to collaborate: if a shadow agent deployment is spotted by security tools, it can quickly and automatically steer the agent into the proper governance workstream.
Enterprises are rightfully investing in agents. But if they want that investment to translate into impact, they should be making equal commitments to agent integration and orchestration. Otherwise, they will end up with a whole that is less than the sum of its parts. In 2025 and beyond, it won't just be the businesses with the best agents that win. It will be the businesses with the most flexible ones.
This article was produced as part of TechRadarPro's Expert Insights channel where we feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today. The views expressed here are those of the author and are not necessarily those of TechRadarPro or Future plc. If you are interested in contributing find out more here: https://www.techradar.com/news/submit-your-story-to-techradar-pro