11 Jun
Blog

The Outer Worlds Switch Review: Another Disappointing Port

the outer worlds change the evaluation

The Outer Worlds for Switch Rating: Port tariffs bad

“The Outer Worlds is a fun game. It's just a shame that the switch port doesn't run better. "

  • Great world exploration

  • Well-written dialogue

  • No content is cut out of the game

  • Terrible step in the graphics

  • Bad frame rate

  • Sputtering and pop-ins

  • Long loading times

Just when it looked like the horde of badly rushed switch ports was behind us The outer worlds proves that there is always room for more.

News that The outer worlds would come to Nintendo's hugely popular switch console, cautiously optimistic. I thought it might have the polish that other switch ports were missing as no attempt was made to make up for the console's success. While this version is not an unplayable bug, which is more than can be said of some other ports, it is certainly not well made – and does not do justice to the original game.

A nice mess

The outer worlds wasn't the most visually impressive game when it came out in 2019, but it had stunning aesthetics. What he lacked in character models or high-resolution textures, he made up for with wonderfully detailed planets and a coherent appearance that underlined his snarky capitalist dystopia. When I played on an Xbox One X, I was amazed by the living foliage, the blinding sky, and the lovable rust buckets that were used as spaceships.

On the switch, I felt like I was playing a completely different game. The switch port has not met my expectations in many ways, and more importantly, it does not do justice to the unique style of the game.

When I took my first steps on Terra 2, the introductory planet was in The outer worlds I could immediately say that this port would be rough. Still, I made my way and was convinced that I would find the psychedelic fields that I fell in love with when I first played on Xbox One X. Then I realized that I was in these areas. And they weren't psychedelic at all.

The screenshot of the outer worldsObsidian

Textures look amateurish, and anything outside of your immediate area is a blurry mess. Not only is the bad graphics a big disappointment, it also makes it more difficult to engage in ranged combat. The almost constant pop-ins often took me out of the game and I was frustrated.

To make sure, I briefly revised the game on Xbox One X and PC to see if I remembered wrong. That was not me.

In fact, it was worse than I thought. Entire objects and details such as bricks, bushes or paths have completely disappeared. It's not just about looks. Missing objects change the overall feel of the game, as I now walked through a barren landscape rather than a lush planet. I have lost the feeling of wonder associated with exploring a new world.

Looks bad, plays worse

Play The outer worlds on the switch should be impressive. With more than 10 GB, it takes up more space than many other switch titles, and there are seemingly endless loading screens that indicate that a game is being created that deserves such a long wait. You can easily wait up to 30 seconds every time you enter and leave your ship or building and when you are traveling. There is also a lot of sputtering and lag, especially when it's outside.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and BioShock Infinite done. So why not? The outer worlds?

After a while I wondered if a game of this kind with reduced graphics would ask too much. Maybe this just goes beyond what the switch can handle. But The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and BioShock Infinite managed to make the leap to an acceptable level of quality. So why not? The outer worlds?

The switch port targets an inconspicuous 30 frames per second, but even that feels spotty. This is particularly problematic during combat, in addition to the rendering problems removed. In hand-to-hand combat, I swung wildly against enemies who had just dodged a hair, while long-range combat was difficult due to the unresponsive frame rate. If you wait 30 seconds to reappear when you die in the middle of this mess, the experience will get worse.

It's a shame

The technical problems are indeed insurmountable. They make it impossible to recommend the port.

Still, it's worth remembering The outer worlds is a great game. It's not the best game I've ever played, even within the genre, but it's a solid choice that delivers a decent story and doesn't go beyond the greeting. Fallout fans, especially those who love it Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegaswill love it. Obsidian, the developer behind it The outer worldshas worked on these two Fallout titles and the relationship is easy to see.

The screenshot of the outer worldsObsidian

The outer worlds brings biting wit in small details and dialogues, an abundance of characters that you can love and hate with the same passion, and an open world that is ripe for exploration. The world or worlds are smaller than the maps of other popular open world games, including The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the wild and Witcher 3, they're both on switches. But planet hopping is fun and I enjoyed seeing the worlds differ.

Even though I often wanted to run through my run because of the confused graphics and technical problems, I couldn't help exploring every detail. What does this terminal say? What does this message reveal about a character who has not been around for a long time and whom I will never meet?

Among the porting problems, The outer worlds remains solid and the port offers all the functions and story beats of the original. It's just a shame that things are not going better.

Our opinion

The outer worlds is a great open world first person shooter with well written dialogue and building the world. However, playing on the switch is a disadvantage for the original game. It often feels like a chore.

Is there a better alternative?

Yes. The outer worldson literally any other platform. It is available for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Windows.

You can play under switch games The Witcher 3 or Breath of the wild, However, these titles differ greatly in tone, style and many gameplay elements. There is nothing like it The outer worlds on the counter.

How long it will take?

This can vary a lot depending on how far you want to go in side quests. If you stick to the main quest, you can easily measure 20 hours, but a predecessor will spend closer to 40 on the game. I played for about 30 hours and was picky about which side quests and companion quests I wanted to accept.

Should you buy it

No, you shouldn't buy the switch port from The outer worlds. Unless, and this is a slightly special exception, the Switch is your only gaming device and this game is your alley. If you don't have a PC to run the game on, a PS4 or Xbox One – and many players don't – then for sure. The problem is not there The outer worlds. It's like the game is so much better wherever you can play it. For Fallout or FPS fans who only rely on the Switch, however, it's a good title to add to the library. Just be prepared for an imperfect game.

Editor's recommendations




11 Jun
Blog

Stop Overdoing Sport Specific Training

For most lifters, specificity is an overused training philosophy. I know this is a controversial statement in strength training communities, but I'm still not sorry I said it. It's the truth, and this quarantine gives us a unique moment to test this theory.

Let's talk about what specificity is. In short, it is the training principle that states that you improve a particular skill by performing that skill, not other related exercises, but repeatedly perfecting that particular thing. If it is not yet clear, I believe that the specificity in strength circles has become too dogmatic.

When specificity is needed

But the people who benefit from the specificity are top athletes who have to be exceptionally good at their sport. This applies to elite weight lifters and powerlifters as well as elite sprinters and professional running backs. Most athletes that fit in this category already have solid overall strength, are genetically freaked out, and physically fit for their sport. The only thing left to do is to become more and more efficient with details.

But just liking a sport or even being good at one doesn't make you a top athlete who needs to be overly specific in your training. And I would argue that even the best lifters could benefit from spending some time building non-specific power. The problem is that they never listen.

When the gyms were closed

But one day when we Americans thought we had found out everything, the government decided to shut down the country, including our beloved gyms, and no dumbbells were found at once. There are no garage gyms here in NYC, so we all had to lift in our tiny NYC apartments. This meant that my gym had to transform from a barbell gym to a kettlebell, barbell, and odd object gym overnight. But that was a blessing in disguise.

So what we did differently from most others is that we didn't kill people with senseless metcons.

When Yuri Verkoshansky said, "Any idiot can make another idiot tired." We believed him.

So we threw burpees overboard in favor of light speed work. We focused on individual limb movements and trunk stability work as well as sensible, measurable methods to improve the condition of our athletes. At times, this included things like AMAP sets, which were not used as finishers, but rather were incorporated into training cycles aimed at building up work capacities. There is a difference.

More important than anything else, we have developed programming that targets where we knew our lifters were defective. By definition, these movements are not specific. But I'm going to tell you what's going to happen, not because I'm a clairvoyant, but because I've been here for a while. You will come back better.

To be able to better define it, we have to be clear: these athletes have neither additional weight for their primary lifts nor larger muscles. That doesn't mean better here. What will be better is that they return to training with:

The long-lasting effect of this phenomenon is that in the long run they become better, healthier and, yes, stronger. Not seeing training in this regard means neglecting one of the most basic principles of human strength.

We can only accumulate until we need a delay. This should be done in your training at both the micro and macro levels. So let's do a favor and Use this time to do what we should have done a long time ago – stop exaggerating the details.

If you are in New York or are ever in the area, drop by and visit me at JDI Barbell, one of the few standalone barbell boxing gyms in town.

10 Jun
Blog

Lenovo Yoga C640 Review: The Ultimate Student Laptop?

Lenovo Yoga C640 Review C740 01

Lenovo Yoga C640 Review: The Ultimate Student Laptop?

"The Lenovo Yoga C640 is a killer value for students and budget laptop buyers."

  • Great battery life

  • Clean, portable design

  • Excellent ad for the price

  • Enormous value

  • Solid build quality

  • The keyboard is a bit flat

  • No Thunderbolt 3 port

You don't have to spend more than a thousand dollars on your next laptop. This is especially true if you are a student or a person who prefers office apps.

Lenovo apparently agrees, as its new Yoga C640 for $ 600 is specifically targeted at this target group. This is a very attractive price for a laptop that makes few compromises.

Unlike its adventurous predecessor, the Yoga C640 is a proven Intel laptop with a 10th generation Intel Core i3 processor, 8 GB RAM and a 128 GB SSD. Did Lenovo make the best laptop you can buy at this price?

design

The Yoga C640 has a fully aluminum construction that does not do justice to the low prices. There is a small piece of flex in the keyboard shelf and on the bottom of the case, and there is no flex on the lid. It doesn't quite match the build quality of some other Yoga models, like the much more expensive Yoga C930.

The lid can be opened almost with one hand, with only a little friction lifting the chassis floor off the surface of the desk. However, this is a 360-degree convertible 2-in-1, which means that the display changes from clamshell to tent, media and tablet modes. The tight hinge ensures that the display stays in place in all of these modes.

The Yoga C640 feels more elegant and modern than most $ 600 laptops.

Like many yogas today, the aesthetics are pretty conservative. It is a gray color in gunmetal without bling. There is no chrome stitch on the laptop, except for a small stain that surrounds the logo. It won't be noticed in a crowd, especially not compared to laptops like the Specter x360 13 from HP, the "Look at me!" Compared to the $ 650 Acer Swift 3 with its typical silver chassis, the Yoga C640 seems to me to have a more elegant and modern design. The same is true compared to the $ 560 HP Pavilion x360, which isn't as refined and slim as the Yoga C640.

The Yoga C640 is not the smallest 13-inch notebook. At first, the bezels are not huge, but not as small as the Specter x360 13 or the Dell XPS 13. This makes the case a bit larger than that of very small 13-inch laptops. However, the Yoga C640 is quite thin. It measures 0.67 inches thick, which is identical to the Specter x360 and only slightly thicker than the XPS 13. The Yoga C640 weighs 2.98 pounds compared to the HP at 2.88 pounds and the Dell at 2.8 pounds. Portability is comparable to these high-end laptops, although they are much cheaper.

The Yoga C640 receives the same type of privacy screen for the webcam that adorns the ThinkPad line. This is called TrueBlock Privacy Shutter and works similarly. Simply slide it over to physically block the webcam. I prefer the HP button on the Specter x360 13, which turns the webcam off electronically and hackers don't have anything in the system they can access if you want to turn off the 720p webcam.

Connectivity is mediocre even for a budget microlight. There are two USB-A 3.1 ports, a USB-C 3.1 port and a 3.5 mm audio jack. There's no Thunderbolt 3 port – not that we're expecting one for this price – and no microSD card reader, which is disappointing. Wireless connectivity is also a step back with Wi-Fi 5 (instead of the newer Wi-Fi 6 standard) and Bluetooth 5.0.

Keyboard and touchpad

If you like the typical Lenovo Yoga keyboard, you will love the Yoga C640. As always, it has a lot of space and a crisp mechanism. The trip is a little too flat for my taste, but I consistently hit about 90% of my usual 90 words per minute or so. I still prefer the keyboard of the HP Specter x360, and the new Magic keyboard of the latest Apple MacBooks is my absolute favorite.

Thanks to the Microsoft Precision touchpad drivers and a smooth and comfortable surface, the touchpad also works well. It's not a big touchpad, but it takes up most of the available space under the keyboard for a modern, efficient design.

As with all 2-in-1 devices, the display is touch sensitive and as precise as expected. Lenovo has added support for its active pen with 4,096 pressure sensitivity levels (the pen itself is an option for $ 69). This is acceptable at this price, and although I haven't had a chance to test the coloring on the Yoga C640, I suspect it will be as good as the rest of the Yoga line.

Windows 10 Hello login support without a password is provided by a fingerprint reader in the top right corner of the keyboard deck. It is very accurate and fairly quick – I never had to swipe again to log on to the Yoga C640. Once again, Lenovo has built a valuable feature into an affordable laptop.

display

One area where budget laptops are often neglected is the display quality. And that makes sense – manufacturers have to cut costs somewhere in order to fit in a cheap price range. After so much good news with the Yoga C640, I approached the display test with some concern.

As it turns out, I shouldn't have worried. According to my colorimeter, Lenovo chose an average display, that is, an average display for premium laptops. For a $ 600 laptop, it's excellent. The colors weren't particularly wide at 73% of AdobeRGB and 96% of sRGB, but they're suitable for everyone except the most demanding photo and video editors.

The contrast was very good at 1040: 1, which is above our preferred threshold of 1000: 1, and the color accuracy was excellent for an inexpensive laptop at 1.07 (anything below 1.0 is considered excellent). The ZenBook 13 UX333's display had slightly more colors and contrasts, but the Yoga's display was more accurate, even though creative people wouldn't like it. The brightness was her weak point at 242 nits. I like it when displays in brightly lit environments reach at least 300 nits for good graphics.

Still, the Yoga C640's display is comfortable for both productivity work and watching Netflix. The latter was made more pleasant by audio, which as usual had little bass, but was loud and clear and had clear mids and highs. You want to connect headphones to get the best music quality. However, you can flip the display and enjoy Netflix bingeing without having to worry about connecting an external sound.

performance

If you switch from the Qualcomm 650 ARM CPU of the C730 to an Intel Core processor, you can expect a leap in performance. The dual-core core i3 is the entry-level model in the current core product line from Intel and does not quite correspond to the four standard cores that you see in premium laptops. However, Windows 10 runs faster than an ARM CPU and doesn't give up compatibility with older desktop applications and peripherals.

I couldn't make a direct objective comparison between the two processors because not all of our benchmarks are run on ARM. I ran Geekbench 4 on the Yoga C640 and it doubled the performance of the Yoga C630 in the single-core test and was more than 30% faster in the multi-core test. With 4,670 single-core and 8,750 multi-core values, the Core i3 is far behind the next level of the core CPU, the Core i5, which achieved over 15,000 points in the multi-core test. A laptop like the Lenovo Yoga C740 equipped with the Core i5 is significantly faster with more demanding workloads and multitasking.

The Yoga C640 will be fast enough for office workers and students.

The Yoga C640 took almost 6.5 minutes to complete our handbrake test, which converted 4K video at 420MB to H.265. The Yoga C740 ended 2 minutes faster. Our previous low-cost laptop, the Asus ZenBook UX333, was completed around the same time with its 8th generation Core i5. Suffice it to say that this entry-level Yoga C640 is not suitable for heavy-duty applications.

While it's far from the fastest laptop I've tested, I found it fast enough for my usual work. For ordinary office workers and students, the Yoga C640 is fast enough to keep up with their work. Note, however, that you can upgrade to a 10th generation quad-core Core i5 and a 256GB SSD for just $ 170 more while keeping the laptop's budget and increasing performance and storage significantly. This is around $ 100 less than the comparable ZenBook UX333 (8th generation).

Note that if you are a player, this is not the right laptop for you. You're limited to Intel UHD graphics, which let you play older titles with lower resolutions and graphic details, but choke on modern things.

Battery life

Next is the battery life, the main strength of the predecessor of the Yoga C640. This year's model still has the same battery life of 60 watt hours and has a CPU that may be less efficient on paper. So I was looking forward to seeing how it was compared in our standard battery tests.

The results were fascinating. First, the Yoga C640 took around 3.5 hours in our demanding Basemark web benchmark test, which loads the CPU, an average score for a Windows 10 laptop. The Yoga C630 lasted almost 9 hours, a spectacular score. The benchmark was slower, but it shows that ARM CPUs can consume power even under stress. The ZenBook 13 UX333 took almost 5 hours to complete this test, making it a longer-lasting option for demanding jobs.

With a single charge, you can watch amazing videos on the Yoga C640 for 24 hours.

In our web browsing test, which is a good indicator of overall productivity longevity, the Yoga C640 took about 10.5 hours, an hour behind the Yoga C630. Again, the Yoga C640 did a good job on a Windows 10 laptop – for example, it surpasses the 8 hours of the Acer Swift 3 – but it's not in a completely different class. When I ran our video test, where a 1080p Avengers trailer was looped until the battery showed that the Yoga C640 shocked me. It ran just over 23 hours, the best score we saw in this test. This even exceeded the very expensive Dell Latitude 7400, our previous leader, by a full 80 minutes.

The bottom line: if you want to watch videos on the Yoga C640, you can do that for almost 24 hours, which is remarkable. When you do standard productivity work, you get a whole day of work with the laptop.

Our opinion

The Lenogo Yoga C640 is an excellent laptop for $ 600 and a very good budget option for $ 770 if you upgrade to a Core i5 and 256 GB of storage. It's well built, has great input options, offers good productivity performance and superior battery life for the price, and looks good too.

In fact, it is so good that it replaces the Asus ZenBook UX333 as our favorite affordable laptop. The fact that you get the flexibility of a 2-in-1 for less money is just the icing on the cake.

Are there alternatives?

The ZenBook UX333 is a competitive option if you only need a Clamshell laptop. Hopefully Asus will update it to 10th generation CPUs as it is limited to 8th generation parts.

If you can spend more money, the HP Specter x360 13 is a great 2-in-1 alternative. It's faster, has a better display option with its OLED panel, and is one of the hottest laptops ever.

If you are looking for a laptop with a 360 degree hinge, I recommend the HP Specter x360. It's small and nifty like the Dell XPS 13 and a little cheaper.

If you're a MacOS fan, you can consider the new MacBook Air. It's faster, has the superb Magic keyboard, and comes as close to the budget as you'll find in the Apple range.

How long it will take?

Thanks to up-to-date components and a solid construction, the Yoga C640 lasts as long as you need it. The only real limitation is the lack of Thunderbolt 3 support, but you can't expect this high-speed sport for just $ 600. As usual, the 1-year warranty is standard and disappointing.

Should you buy it

Yes. The Yoga C640 is an uncomplicated laptop set at an attractive price.

Editor's recommendations




10 Jun
Blog

7 Summer Skin Care Tips For Oily Skin

If your skin looks less than dull at best, it can turn into an oil slick in summer. As the temperature rises, so does the humidity – and this can lead to an increase in oil production from your skin's sebaceous glands.

While sebum contains lipids and fats that protect your skin from drying out of environmental stressors, too much sebum can make the surface of the skin particularly greasy.

Tips to transform your skin from summer fat to summer glow

1. Clean properly

Double cleansing can be the key to getting rid of oily skin in summer. As we say at Eminence Organics, "Like attracts like" and using a gentle oil cleaner as the first step in your cleaning routine can make a big difference. We recommend our Stone Crop Cleansing Oil to gently remove makeup and remove oil-based products from your pores. The lightening stone plant moisturizes and moisturizes for a healthy looking complexion.

Then clean on a larger scale with the Clear Skin Probiotic Cleanser. Regardless of whether your skin tends to break out, switching to a cleanser designed for problematic skin can help make your skin look dull in the oil-inducing summer months (Curls). This award-winning cleanser is blended with cucumber, tea tree oil, and yogurt to treat oily skin without removing moisture.

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Stone fruit cleaning oil

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Probiotic cleaner for clear skin

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2. Remember to wear sunscreen

While applying sunscreen looks like a recipe for disaster for an oily complexion, Allure says, "A healthy dose of sunscreen (a teaspoon for your face) surprisingly helps control oil and shine." Alternatively, you can use our Sun Defense Minerals choose for your sun care and check the appearance of the shine all day long. The breathtaking supermodel Kate Upton doesn't drive without a vacation.

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Sun Defense Minerals

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3. Makeup Free

Take a cue from Alicia Keys and embrace your beauty this summer without makeup – or at least do without your foundation! In summer, not only is there a brighter trend, but the melting makeup can also clog the pores and cause your skin to produce more oil.

4. Avoid cocktails and spicy food

The saying is true: "You are what you eat" – and during the hot summer months, cocktails and spicy food can destroy your complexion. These increase your heat index, which makes you feel warmer and sweat more. Sweat is not a bad thing by nature, but it can lead to clogged pores if it stays on the surface of the skin for too long. The result? Skin that looks shiny rather than moist. Instead, reach for foods with a high vitamin A content and slow oil production such as carrots, melon and spinach (Curls).

5. Don't forget to exfoliate

Peeling is an important part of every skin care routine, especially if your skin is oily. Regular peeling helps remove dead skin cells that have accumulated on the surface of the skin, clog the pores and tarnish the complexion. We recommend our Stone Crop Oxygenating Fizzofoliant, which contains rice flour and Adzuki powder to polish and smooth the skin structure, and Stone Crop to moisturize and moisturize. This peeling for everyday use gently removes impurities with its light effervescent effect and ensures a perfectly polished complexion.

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Stone Crop Oxygenating Fizzofoliant

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6. Treat your skin to a mask

Dr. Oz recommends applying a clay mask once or twice a week to degrease summer skin. Our Balancing Masque Duo contains kaolin clay and charcoal to remove oil, dirt and bacteria that cause excess sebum, and Buchu leaf extract to reduce oil production and mattify the skin's appearance. Add the moisture Grapefruit cheek treatment to restore moisture to the skin and minimize the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.

7. Yes, you still need to moisturize

Adding moisture to oily skin may not seem intuitive, but hydrating the skin is key to maintaining balance and controlling oil production. If you're wondering, "Should you use oily skin moisturizer?" The answer is a resounding yes. If you are looking for the best moisturizer for oily skin, we recommend the Clear Skin Probiotic Moisturizer. This beauty editor favorite includes cucumber juice, tea tree, and willow bark (a natural astringent) to tighten and reduce the appearance of your pores, leaving you with soft – never shiny – skin.

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Probiotic moisturizer for clear skin

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How do you deal with oily skin? We'd love to hear your tips and tricks! Let us know in the comments below and join the conversation on social media.

10 Jun
Blog

Stop Overdoing Sport Specific Training

For most lifters, specificity is an overused training philosophy. I know this is a controversial statement in strength training communities, but I'm still not sorry I said it. It's the truth, and this quarantine gives us a unique moment to test this theory.

Let's talk about what specificity is. In short, it is the training principle that says you master a certain skill better by performing that skill, not other related exercises, but repeatedly perfecting that particular thing. If it is not yet clear, I believe that the specificity in strength circles has become too dogmatic.

When specificity is needed

But the people who benefit from the specificity are top athletes who have to be exceptionally good at their sport. This applies to elite weight lifters and powerlifters as well as elite sprinters and professional running backs. Most athletes that fit in this category already have solid overall strength, are genetically freaked out, and physically fit for their sport. The only thing left to do is to become more and more efficient with details.

But just liking a sport or even being good at it doesn't make you a top athlete who needs to be too specific in your training. And I would argue that even the best lifters could benefit from spending some time building non-specific power. The problem is that they never listen.

When the gyms were closed

But one day when we Americans thought we had found out everything, the government decided to shut down the country, including our beloved gyms, and no dumbbells were found at once. There are no garage gyms here in NYC, so we all had to lift in our tiny NYC apartments. This meant that my gym had to transform from a barbell gym to a kettlebell, barbell, and odd object gym overnight. But that was a blessing in disguise.

So what we did differently from most others is that we didn't kill people with senseless metcons.

When Yuri Verkoshansky said, "Any idiot can make another idiot tired." We believed him.

So we threw burpees overboard in favor of light speed work. We focused on individual limb movements and trunk stability work as well as sensible, measurable methods to improve the condition of our athletes. At times, this included things like AMAP sets, which were not used as finishers, but were incorporated into training cycles that were aimed at building up work capacities. There is a difference.

More important than anything else, we have developed programming that targets where we knew our lifters were defective. By definition, these movements are not specific. But I'm going to tell you what's going to happen, not because I'm a clairvoyant, but because I've been here for a while. You will come back better.

To be able to better define it, we have to be clear: these athletes have neither additional weight for their primary lifts nor larger muscles. That doesn't mean better here. What will be better is that they return to training with:

The long-lasting effect of this phenomenon is that in the long run they become better, healthier and, yes, stronger. Not seeing training in this regard means neglecting one of the most basic principles of human strength.

We can only accumulate until we need a delay. This should be done in your training at both the micro and macro levels. So let's do a favor and Use this time to do what we should have done a long time ago – stop exaggerating the details.

If you are in New York or are ever in the area, drop by and visit me at JDI Barbell, one of the few standalone barbell boxing gyms in town.

10 Jun
Blog

Huawei P40 Pro Plus Review-in-progress: Zooming Ahead

huawei p40 pro plus practical features price photos release date hand

Huawei P40 Pro Plus test in progress: zoom forward

"The superiority of Huawei's 10x optical zoom on the P40 Pro Plus over any other large zoom phone cannot be questioned."

  • Excellent zoom camera

  • Outstanding design

  • Strong all-round performance

  • Very expensive

  • Violent for its size

  • Access to some apps is missing

The P40 Pro has the best camera I've tested on an Android phone, but Huawei isn't done with the P40 series yet. The P40 Pro Plus is the real flagship in the range. It takes the camera further than not just the P40 Pro, but every other high-end camera phone available today.

I spent a few days with the P40 Pro Plus. This is my ongoing review as I work towards a final verdict next week. Although I have not yet reached my final result, one thing is certain. Huawei has raised the bar for zooming a smartphone.

P40 Pro vs. P40 Pro Plus

The P40 Pro Plus is the first cell phone in the Huawei P series to be technically superior to the Pro model. So what makes it different?

Visually, it is almost identical to the P40 Pro. However, the body is made of glass, metal and ceramic and weighs 226 grams compared to 209 grams on the P40 Pro. The same 6.58-inch OLED screen is on the front, the case is still waterproof to IP68 and is powered by the Kirin 990 5G chipset and 8 GB of RAM. Even the battery has the same capacity of 4,200 mAh, with 40 W wired fast charging or 40 W wireless charging.

The main difference is the camera. The 50-megapixel ultra-vision and 40-megapixel cine camera sensors are identical until you get to the new 8-megapixel periscope lens that Huawei calls SuperZoom. This enables a massive 10x optical zoom on the P40 Pro Plus compared to the 12mega pixel SuperSensing 5x optical zoom sensor on the P40. The SuperZoom of the P40 Pro is another 8 megapixel telephoto sensor, this time with a 3x optical zoom. The hybrid zoom is set to 20x and the camera to 100x digital zoom.

The P40 series from Huawei, consisting of the standard series P40, P40 Pro and P40 Pro Plus, is comparable to the Samsung Galaxy S20 series with the Galaxy S20, the Galaxy S20 Plus and the Galaxy S20 Ultra.

design

Put the P40 Pro and P40 Pro Plus side by side, and the main way to tell them apart is by the finish. The P40 Pro Plus has a special white or black back made of nano-ech ceramic. Each must be baked in an oven at up to 1,500 degrees Celsius for five days to achieve a sapphire-like shelf life and a reflective look that Huawei compares to that of diamonds. The white version I received looks fabulous, with a deep reflection that is subtly different from glass. It has a smooth, ice cold finish.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

The camera hump on the back is slightly larger than that of the P40 Pro and not only contains an additional sensor that the P40 Pro lacks, but also the incredible new periscope zoom. Look closely and it appears to sink right into the body of the phone and to the other side, an amazing optical illusion created by the complex array of mirrors that make it work. The fact that Huawei managed to squeeze all of this into a case with the same dimensions as the P40 Pro is very impressive.

However, you notice the extra weight. The P40 Pro is already heavy, so the P40 Pro Plus is a real beast of a phone and probably not as balanced. I found that I shuffled it around more in my hand than the P40 because of the extra weight. This is the compromise if you want the mega zoom. With the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra and the iPhone 11 Pro Max, both of which are similarly powerful, it is just right.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

The P40 Pro Plus doesn't change the design of the P40 Pro from the front because it doesn't have to – both are strikingly attractive. However, I still find the large, pill-shaped cutout for the dual-lens selfie camera on the screen that distracts on something other than a black background.

camera

That's why you're here, isn't it? This is the reason why you chose the P40 Pro Plus over the P40 Pro. So is it worth the extra money?

The P40 Pro Plus camera is not perfect, but you need to look for the issues and be extremely critical so that they affect the results. At the time of writing, I only took a few hundred pictures with the P40 Pro Plus, and I have trouble choosing the photos that I want to share first because I like the vast majority.

Most P40 Pro Plus recordings have a wonderful tone and atmosphere that many other phone cameras lack. Although Huawei uses a lot of artificial intelligence (A.I.) and other software tricks to generate the photos, they still look natural, which is almost certainly due to the partnership with Leica. It's easy to forget that Huawei is working with the prestigious camera brand until you start taking pictures. It is no coincidence that they look so good.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

Let's talk about 10x optical zoom. The P40 Pro takes 5x optical zoom and 10x hybrid images. So can you tell the difference? Yes, you really can. From two floors up I took the photo of the wood you see below, and although the wood itself is not that different in the two photos, take a closer look at the black rubber in the middle. The photo of the P40 Pro Plus clearly shows that it has a texture that is completely missing in the hybrid image of the P40 Pro.

If you zoom in on the taillight on the photo of the Toyota pickup, you can see the Toyota branding on the edge of the cluster on the Pro Plus photo, which is too pixelated in the photo of the P40 Pro. You can also see how sharp the reflections are when they follow the contours of the vehicle and also the running bar. The optical system removes all of the digital processing that creates these pixelated details. However, some adjustments still need to be made here, as the photo of the P40 Pro Plus has a green tone in some areas. Although the deeper black is accurate, it loses some of the gloss of the P40 Pro's photo.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

The 10x optical zoom gives you the certainty of getting closer to subjects when taking pictures, which I already enjoyed when taking pictures of wild animals. Distance is important for this type of photography, as is the quality of the end result, and the P40 Pro Plus has great potential for great photos of animals. However, in my photos of the squirrel, all of which were taken in a forest area speckled with sunlight, it seems that some exposure work still needs to be done.

With the P40 Pro Plus, the zoom can be increased 100 times. The images are better than those of the Galaxy S20 Ultra, but you won't want to share them again anytime soon. I like the addition of a handy second picture-in-picture viewfinder to make focusing and composition easier. Testing is still in its infancy, but based on the photos I've taken so far, the P40 Pro Plus seems to have improved the zoom of the P40 Pro, and Huawei has made another massive advance in technology. No other brand comes close to that at the moment.

Software and performance

The P40 Pro Plus has the same Kirin 990 5G chipset and Android 10 software as the P40 Pro, and Google Mobile Services is not installed. Instead, you get apps from the Huawei App Gallery and the Amazon App Store, or by using APK files that are obtained from third-party providers. I have already written about my experience with apps on Huawei phones with Huawei Mobile Services, and the P40 Pro Plus is no different from the P40 Pro and the folding smartphone Mate Xs.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

This means you have to change your mindset and may have to leave Google behind after purchasing the P40 Pro Plus. It is not possible to install Google Mobile Services and use the Play Store. However, some Google Apps work if you install them through APKs. However, you cannot log in with your Google account. Huawei's app gallery is growing, but there are still gaps, including Netflix, many local banking services, and social media apps.

In the past few days, I haven't noticed any difference in the performance of the phone compared to the P40 Pro, but unfortunately this means that the same problems with notifications that aren't always shown continue to exist. The battery only needed to be charged once over four days, so the P40 Pro's excellent battery life seems to have been transferred, but I will test this further in the coming week.

Conclusion

The Huawei P40 Pro Plus arrives about a month after the P40 Pro, a phone that costs £ 899 or about $ 1,140. The P40 Pro Plus costs £ 1,299, or about $ 1,645. That's a massive difference in cost considering that the main differences are the changes that allow 10x optical zoom and the pretty ceramic back. The P40 Pro Plus is a very, very expensive device.

From today's perspective, it's hard to say that the P40 Pro Plus justifies its significantly higher cost considering how well the cheaper (if still expensive) P40 Pro can hold its own against its main competitor, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra . Maybe more will show up if I keep using the phone.

However, the superiority of Huawei's 10x optical zoom on the P40 Pro Plus over any other large zoom phone cannot be questioned. It's excellent, and like so many P-series phones before, the phone is driving the industry forward as Huawei's competitors have to work again to catch up.

The Huawei P40 Pro Plus can be pre-ordered in the UK on June 15th. The final release will be on June 25th. It is not officially sold in the United States, but can be purchased through an import service.

Editor's recommendations




09 Jun
Blog

There is no CrossFit, Just Good and Bad Coaching

Most people are now aware of the backlash against Greg Glassman, the founder and CEO of CrossFit, for speaking deaf, insensitive, and dismissively about George Floyd's death and COVID-19.

We don't have to reheat all of this here because it has killed everywhere else. However, we have to deal with one thing, the future of boxing gyms, especially since they struggle to open up in a post-pandemic and, as it seems likely, in a post-CrossFit world. The simple fact is that there is no CrossFit.

CrossFit is a brand. It is a name and an ideal. It was once a proponent of a process that organized high-intensity interval training (HIIT) into a methodology for functional fitness and general physical readiness (GPP).

It has made Olympic weightlifting, kettlebells, tabata, EMOM, gymnastics and weight training popular in group training. They either loved or hated CrossFit. For many personal trainers and strength and conditioning trainers, it was the entrance ticket to a gym, many of which started in their own garages.

CrossFit enabled boxing gyms to find a mainstream audience. It also helped private training studios find an identity and tie them all to the brand.

For this, the boxing gym owners paid participation fees for certifications, affiliation and finally for CrossFit Open and Games. The certifications went from Level I and Level II across all disciplines like a CrossFit Strongman approach.

Affiliations was a simple startup kit for aspiring fitness entrepreneurs. Simply log in to CrossFit and wait for customers to log in. The Open and the Games were recruiting tools, aspirations and community building.

CrossFit always sucked

While the CrossFit community was and is a real thing, CrossFit HQ (CFHQ), the governing body, was anything but collaborative. CFHQ has always been brutal, aggressive, insecure, controversial, and just disgusting to anyone who ticked it off. For many people who got caught in the crossfire, CrossFit was an organization. For some, it seemed more of a cult than a fitness company.

While CrossFit flourished worldwide, opened markets everywhere, and became synonymous with crazy-intense workouts that made you vomit or have to lie in a deep pool of your own sweat, it never took responsibility for individual partners and never really had a hand in it Hand providing training and programming instructions that are not provided through certification.

In fact, CrossFit transferred everything to the affiliates, although they were supported by their own lawyers when they felt their brand was under attack and never really committed to defining a CrossFit training or method that they are responsible for the liability.

In other words, there are no CrossFit workouts because the brand is legally defined. Sure, there are CrossFit workouts like Fran or Murph. We all know them.

However, no partner could claim to have offered CrossFit training, especially if this training harmed someone. Affiliates offered their own workouts under the patronage of a CrossFit box.

It didn't matter because the world did everything it wanted to do with the CrossFit name. It became mythical training for the general press, and it became a confusing mess of inconsistent quality for consumers who went to affiliates who didn't really know what they were getting.

The Darwinian CrossFit Box Gym

Glassman had always expected the subsidiaries to rise and fall due to market forces. The good would survive and the bad would fail. It was supposed to be libertarian or something, but ultimately it only caused inconsistency, unreliable coaching, and poor programming because there was no oversight.

And it didn't matter when the brand took off. There were times when in some densely populated areas three or four CrossFit boxes were within a few blocks of each other. From a business perspective, this didn't make sense, but everyone passed the same money on to the CFHQ, so it didn't matter.

Sure, over time it became clear that you can't build a business through wear and tear, especially if you ask your business partners to go to war with each other and pay you for the privilege.

But that didn't stop Glassman. When the US CrossFit market started to stagnate and shrink, international markets picked up. The United States was three or four years ahead of the rest of the world.

Whether CrossFit made good or bad business decisions pales in comparison to what happens to CrossFit partners when they make bad decisions. If the separation becomes a thing and CrossFit, like any other fitness fad or fitness trend, loses relevance, the question arises as to what replaces the workout.

Anything that is not CrossFit could be and vice versa

CrossFit box owners must recognize that they are the brand behind the workouts. Consumers should be aware that a CrossFit partner's head coach or trainer is the person responsible for the training, not the CFHQ.

Once you do this, you will find that CrossFit is irrelevant despite what it has done. It was irrelevant, and thinking differently is exaggerating his ability to do great coaching and training.

Sure, maybe CrossFit is an acronym that everyone can understand. But box gym too. Box gyms are also an abbreviation. CrossFit partners are all boxing gyms, which means that they are not globo-gyms or orange theory or SoulCycle or gyms. There are pull-up bars, barbells, kettlebells, rowing machines, rings, sweat and chalk.

If anyone wishing to cancel their membership agrees to call themselves Box Gym, we at Breaking Mucle would like to standardize this terminology.

Let's face it, box gyms do HIIT, Tabata, EMOM, AMRAPs, weight lifting, personal training, deadlifts, handstand walks, burpees and, as much as we hate, wall balls. What else do you need?

09 Jun
Blog

Amazon Fire HD 8 Review (2020): Low-Priced for a Reason

amazon fire hd 8 2020 review 3

"The Amazon Fire HD 8 is the only sensible choice in its price range, but there are good reasons for that."

  • Amazon integration

  • Very affordable

  • Good battery life

  • Alexa

  • Software can feel like an advertisement

  • Slow performance

  • Below average display

The tablet market is in a strange place. Apple dominates and the iPad is our first choice for those who can spend up to $ 300. However, if you can't (or don't want to) spend that much or just don't like the Apple ecosystem, your options are limited. Amazon is one of the few alternatives that has been offering extremely affordable tablets for years. An updated version of the Amazon Fire HD 8 tablet was recently released.

Amazon's new Fire HD 8 isn't fundamentally different from the previous generation Fire HD 8, but it does offer some upgrades. For example, there is now a USB-C connector on the bottom as well as a new chip that offers 30% better performance.

However, the heading is still the price. At an extremely low price of $ 90, the Fire HD 8 may be the best option under $ 100 – also because it's one of the few options under $ 100. But what are the victims?

A basic design with a few quirks

The Fire HD 8 offers an 8-inch display with a half-inch frame around the display. The tablet is available in different colors, which is perhaps the most unique thing about it. These colors include white, black, twilight blue and plum. I checked the white model and it looks good enough – although the more colorful models have more flair.

As someone who normally uses the entry-level iPad for all tablet needs, the Fire HD 8 feels a bit thick at 9.7mm compared to 7.5mm from the iPad. Given the overall size, it's still pretty light. However, once you add a case, it becomes even stronger. Because of this mass, the tablet feels relatively tough. It is largely made of plastic, which does not scratch or dent easily.

The layout of the buttons and ports on the Fire HD 8 could take some work. The webcam is arranged horizontally rather than vertically. When used in the horizontal layout, the volume rocker, the power switch, the USB-C connector and the headphone jack are on the left. In the end, I didn't mind the layout, but it's a little strange to have the USB-C port on top and the power switch and volume rocker on the bottom if you want to use the device in portrait mode. There is a MicroSD card slot on the right to expand the built-in memory.

This is the first Fire HD tablet to have a USB-C port. You won't be charged really fast through this connector, but it is convenient to charge your modern devices with the same cables, and the inclusion of such a connector is somewhat overdue for Amazon.

There is a 2-megapixel camera on the back of the device, which takes mediocre pictures at best. The selfie camera on the front is also 2 megapixels in size. Even if it is suitable for video chatting, a better camera would have been desirable.

Overall, the Fire HD 8 is designed to get the job done. Due to the low price, you have to do without the premium feeling of Apple's iPad for beginners, but this does not make the use of the tablet difficult.

Mediocre display

While the design is okay, the display leaves something to be desired. This is also to be expected from a device in this price range, but it is still important to note.

The 8-inch LCD display has a resolution of 800 x 1,280, which is slightly below average. The maximum brightness is also low. Therefore, in direct sunlight, you may have difficulty seeing what you are doing. The colors are also subdued, making videos less haunting and exciting.

Digital Trends found that the display was somewhat flawed when reviewing the 2018 Fire HD 8 model. It is therefore disappointing that Amazon has not updated it. While the display does the job in most situations, you will have problems using it outdoors, and the films will not look as sharp as on more expensive tablets.

Poor performance, good battery life

It doesn't look much better under the hood. Android devices often work well when you receive them. In the next few years, they will slow down. Unfortunately, this is not the case here. The Amazon Fire 8 HD is ready to use.

This tablet is powered by a MediaTek MT8168 processor with 2 GB RAM and 32 GB or 64 GB storage. If you want to expand this memory, a microSD card slot is integrated in the device.

The specs are undoubtedly modest, and while the tablet performs well in everyday use, if you are interested in mobile games, you will need something with a little more momentum unless you are mainly interested in basic games. This tablet is not suitable for games. However, it should be fine for streaming videos, surfing social media, etc.

While the performance is somewhat disappointing, the battery life is solid. Amazon rated the battery life up to 12 hours, and I found that it could easily stand two days of moderate use. If you don't regularly forget to charge your devices, you'll find that battery life is more than long enough for most.

Amazon forward software

Aside from the price, the main reason someone wants to buy a Fire HD tablet is to integrate with the rest of the Amazon ecosystem. For those who use more stripped-down versions of Android on their cell phones, such as those on Google's pixel cell phones or OxygenOS from OnePlus, the highly optimized Fire OS on the Fire HD 8 looks a bit chaotic – and sometimes a bit dated.

Deep integration with Amazon services can be very helpful for Prime subscribers who already use Amazon's apps and services heavily. Thanks to the instantly installed apps, you get quick and instant access to services such as Audible, Prime Video, Kindle, etc.

Many of these services are also integrated directly into the start screen. Swipe right and you'll have access to your books. Swipe right again and you'll see videos. There are games and apps again. It's an intuitive way to scroll through Amazon's services. However, if you're not using every single Amazon service, these sections of the home screen are for promotional purposes only – in full-screen mode. For example, on the Video tab, you can only view Prime Video content. Even if you download the Netflix app, you shouldn't expect Amazon to recommend content on this tab.

Fire OS does not use Google Play services, so you can only access Google services like Google Drive, YouTube, etc. if you download them. Even then, you won't be able to access the Google Play Store without great effort.

The Amazon Appstore is also limited. There are many gaps in most streaming services, social media apps, and some of the most popular games. For example, you can't download an official YouTube app, and the fitness junkies can't download services like MyFitnessPal.

Then you have the ads. If you take full advantage of Amazon services, you may not care so much about them – but if you choose in general, as most people are likely to do, the ads will get a little much. Every time you see the lock screen, you see a different set of books or shows that Amazon believes you want to read or view, and Amazon regularly fills your notification shadow with other ads.

Alexa is part of the Fire tablet experience and works well. They have all the Alexa functions you need for the Echo, as well as the ability to control certain aspects of the tablet software, such as: B. opening certain apps, playing videos on Prime Video etc.

If you are something like me, you will ultimately have a love-hate relationship with Fire OS. It works great in many situations, but only if you're seriously connected to the Amazon ecosystem – and if not, much of the operating system is just bloatware.

Price, availability and warranty information

The slow performance, bloated software, and limited app selection would be unforgivable if it weren't for the price. At $ 90, however, there is almost no competition for the Fire HD 8. You might find a cheap Samsung or Lenovo tablet that matches the price, but otherwise you'd have to look for no-name tablets that aren't offered to everyone Advantage over the Fire HD 8.

Of course, this tablet is available directly from Amazon. You only get a 90-day limited warranty here, which only covers manufacturing defects.

Our opinion

The Amazon Fire HD 8 is a solid budget option for those who need an entertainment device or are connected to the Amazon ecosystem and are looking for a device that uses it. However, the device is far from perfect. It has a relatively poor performance, the software can feel like a big advertisement, and the display is not great.

Is there a better alternative?

There are no solid alternatives in this price range, as the available options come from no-name brands or are underwhelmed. It may be worth taking a look at a refurbished iPad or saving money for something better, like a cheap Lenovo option or the entry-level iPad – although the entry-level iPad still costs $ 250 on sale.

How long it will take?

You should get a year or two of normal use of Amazon Fire HD 8. Slow performance worsens over time, which you should be aware of as it is not particularly good at first, but if you only really use it when watching videos and browsing social media, this should be fine. Physically, the tablet is strong enough to withstand most everyday use, but you don't want to drop it or get it wet.

Should you buy it

No. Although there is little competition, the Amazon Fire HD 8 is too affordable by itself.

Editor's recommendations




09 Jun
Blog

There is no CrossFit, Just Good and Bad Coaching

Most people are now aware of the backlash against Greg Glassman, the founder and CEO of CrossFit, for speaking deaf, insensitive, and dismissively about George Floyd's death and COVID-19.

We don't have to reheat all of this here because it has killed everywhere else. However, we have to deal with one thing, the future of boxing gyms, especially since they struggle to open up in a post-pandemic and, as it seems likely, in a post-CrossFit world. The simple fact is that there is no CrossFit.

CrossFit is a brand. It is a name and an ideal. It was once a proponent of a process that organized high-intensity interval training (HIIT) into a methodology for functional fitness and general physical readiness (GPP).

It has made Olympic weightlifting, kettlebells, tabata, EMOM, gymnastics and weight training popular in group training. They either loved or hated CrossFit. For many personal trainers and strength and conditioning trainers, it was the entrance ticket to a gym, many of which started in their own garages.

CrossFit enabled boxing gyms to find a mainstream audience. It also helped private training studios find an identity and tie them all to the brand.

For this, the boxing gym owners paid participation fees for certifications, affiliation and finally for CrossFit Open and Games. The certifications went from Level I and Level II across all disciplines like a CrossFit Strongman approach.

Affiliations was a simple startup kit for aspiring fitness entrepreneurs. Simply log in to CrossFit and wait for customers to log in. The Open and the Games were recruiting tools, aspirations and community building.

CrossFit always sucked

While the CrossFit community was and is a real thing, CrossFit HQ (CFHQ), the governing body, was anything but collaborative. CFHQ has always been brutal, aggressive, insecure, controversial, and just disgusting to anyone who ticked it off. For many people who got caught in the crossfire, CrossFit was an organization. For some, it seemed more of a cult than a fitness company.

While CrossFit flourished worldwide, opened markets everywhere, and became synonymous with crazy-intense workouts that made you vomit or have to lie in a deep pool of your own sweat, it never took responsibility for individual partners and never really had a hand in it Hand providing training and programming instructions that are not provided through certification.

In fact, CrossFit transferred everything to the affiliates, although they were supported by their own lawyers when they felt their brand was under attack and never really committed to defining a CrossFit training or method that they are responsible for the liability.

In other words, there are no CrossFit workouts because the brand is legally defined. Sure, there are CrossFit workouts like Fran or Murph. We all know them.

However, no partner could claim to have offered CrossFit training, especially if this training harmed someone. Affiliates offered their own workouts under the patronage of a CrossFit box.

It didn't matter because the world did everything it wanted to do with the CrossFit name. It became mythical training for the general press, and it became a confusing mess of inconsistent quality for consumers who went to affiliates who didn't really know what they were getting.

The Darwinian CrossFit Box Gym

Glassman had always expected the subsidiaries to rise and fall due to market forces. The good would survive and the bad would fail. It was supposed to be libertarian or something, but ultimately it only caused inconsistency, unreliable coaching, and poor programming because there was no oversight.

And it didn't matter when the brand took off. There were times when in some densely populated areas three or four CrossFit boxes were within a few blocks of each other. From a business perspective, this didn't make sense, but everyone passed the same money on to the CFHQ, so it didn't matter.

Sure, over time it became clear that you can't build a business through wear and tear, especially if you ask your business partners to go to war with each other and pay you for the privilege.

But that didn't stop Glassman. When the US CrossFit market started to stagnate and shrink, international markets picked up. The United States was three or four years ahead of the rest of the world.

Whether CrossFit made good or bad business decisions pales in comparison to what happens to CrossFit partners when they make bad decisions. If the separation becomes a thing and CrossFit, like any other fitness fad or fitness trend, loses relevance, the question arises as to what replaces the workout.

Anything that is not CrossFit could be and vice versa

CrossFit box owners must recognize that they are the brand behind the workouts. Consumers should be aware that a CrossFit partner's head coach or trainer is the person responsible for the training, not the CFHQ.

Once you do this, you will find that CrossFit is irrelevant despite what it has done. It was irrelevant, and thinking differently is exaggerating his ability to do great coaching and training.

Sure, maybe CrossFit is an acronym that everyone can understand. But box gym too. Box gyms are also an abbreviation. CrossFit partners are all boxing gyms, which means that they are not globo-gyms or orange theory or SoulCycle or gyms. There are pull-up bars, barbells, kettlebells, rowing machines, rings, sweat and chalk.

If anyone wishing to cancel their membership agrees to call themselves Box Gym, we at Breaking Mucle would like to standardize this terminology.

Let's face it, box gyms do HIIT, Tabata, EMOM, AMRAPs, weight lifting, personal training, deadlifts, handstand walks, burpees and, as much as we hate, wall balls. What else do you need?

08 Jun
Blog

Disney+ Review: An Affordable Ticket to the Magic Kingdom

Disney Plus lifestyle

"While the user interface is rough, it will be difficult to miss the allure of Disney's best films and shows."

  • Disney's best in one place

  • Every Simpsons episode

  • 4K HDR and Dolby Atmos

  • Impressive original series

  • Buggy interface

  • Wonky search

  • Not a recently watched list

It was easy to think for months before his debutDisney + than another streaming service. But as it got closer to the launch date, the opportunities became more enticing. Imagine: The splendor of ground-breaking properties worth a century, from Mickey to Marvel, everything on request. It's a fantastic idea, especially for $ 7 a month.

However, a streaming service is much more than an idea, and as the rocky start of Disney + reminded us, delivering huge files to millions of households via a pipeline scattershot is not easy. Whether it's a studio powerhouse or not, Disney competed against rivals that have been around for over a decade, and initially this type of delivery was pretty overwhelming.

In the months that followed, however, the Disney streamer evolved from a chunky, faulty, work in progress product to something closer to the polished perfection of many of Disney's other companies.

This is not a Netflix clone

Starting Disney + for the first time shows that surface-level design has a lot to like. An appealing layout of the panels above divides the content into five pillars: Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars and (because Disney owns everything) National Geographic.

You can create your own avatar (and turn off background video in Settings), download titles to view offline, and stream on up to four devices at the same time.

Below the main window you will find shows and films, which are divided into helpful categories. These recommend what you should watch based on your viewing habits, display the latest additions to the library, and allow you to watch series or films that you have already seen. At the bottom of the home screen are curated collections that change regularly with topics like animals and nature, Disney Channel movies, beasts and monsters, Out of the Vault, and Disney Through the Decades, which, it sounds, titles from Categorize 1920s. A familiar control panel on the left contains search and start symbols as well as other navigation options. As expected, everything looks very similar to Netflix, but with a Disney touch.

In the early stages of the service, many users struggled to open the app or launch certain titles due to website overload (10 million subscribers signed up in the first few days), while slow loading times seemed taken for granted. There have also been bizarre pragmatic design errors, including the lack of a "Recently Watched" or "Continue Watching" section.

Fortunately, many of the early issues with the service have been resolved, from adding a Watch Next category to the ability for users to restart movies or TV episodes (another feature that was missing at launch).

However, there are still a few problems – including the Wonky search function. For example, if you want to see the original 101 Dalmatians, typing "101" in the search area will show some live action movies and a sequel animated directly on video, but not the original movie. This is because this particular film is called "one hundred one" in the library and the search system is not intelligent enough to find it. Some apps allow voice search directly in the Disney + search area, but finding a particular movie should be a lot easier.

A / V grade, with a hook

A driving force behind Disney's $ 7 value proposition is the inclusion of extras like 4K HDR, Dolby Vision, and Dolby Atmos for select titles at no extra charge. Amazon does this too, but with Netflix you can choose the most expensive tier for this privilege. This option makes watching Disney gems like The Empire Strikes Back in 4K HDR with Atmos pretty epic, even if it's the “Extended Edition”.

(Note: As of June 2020, Dolby Atmos will be temporarily disabled on Disney + for all devices due to bandwidth issues during the coronavirus pandemic.)

But there are some strange obstacles here as well. For one thing, like most services, there are several device restrictions. Currently, the Apple TV 4K generally seems to be the preferred Disney + device for video and audio quality, with Roku's 4K streaming devices in second place (because they don't support Dolby Vision). Other devices like Chromecast, Roku TVs and surprisingly the new Nvidia Shield and Fire TV 4K sticks don't seem to support Atmos at the moment, but they do support HDR.

Disney +

It is more unexpected that the question of which titles will work as advertised still seems to be in question. Like the Star Wars collection, the original series The Mandalorian by Disney + 4K HDR and Dolby Atmos should support. But unlike Empire, I couldn't download The Mandalorian in Atmos on my Apple TV 4K. In the meantime, a colleague was able to download the Star Wars films and The Mandalorian in both 4K HDR and Dolby Atmos on a Roku Streaming Stick +. It is clear that there are still some problems to be solved.

(Note: At the time of publication. Disney has not released a comprehensive list of supported devices for each format. However, we assume that Atmos support will also be available for other devices in the future. Sequel follows …)

Content is indeed king

Access to most of the best Disney products of every generation is fantastic, although the user interface – and some aspects of the presentation – continues to cause problems.

If you grew up with Disney / Pixar, your brain will almost certainly fall into the nostalgically sunken place as you scroll through childhood titles. From sleeping beauty and the fox and the dog to the search for Nemo and Toy Story, everything is there. Mostly.

Your brain will fall into the nostalgically sunken place.

It is clear that Disney + is not exactly comprehensive even for older titles, probably due to licensing issues. I'm a big fan of those old 50s goofy shorts that "teach" you how to do things like driving or skiing – the latter is there, but the former is not. It's something like a pattern. A larger omission is the original Muppet Show, though most films are available.

It's not a big deal, but we hope that eventually everything will show up.

After an initial delay in collecting all Star Wars and Marvel content due to license agreements with Netflix or other terms, both brands are now essentially complete in the Disney + library. There remain one or two exceptions – like the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special, which may not see the light of day anywhere – but the service has practically become a focal point for fans of both franchisees.

In his honor, Disney even accelerated the arrival of some major releases to put them into service as quickly as possible in special circumstances. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and Frozen 2 were launched into the coronavirus pandemic both months earlier than originally planned.

The library also contains many natural shows by Nat Geo, and there are plenty of Disney Channel series for millennials, from Hannah Montana to Boy Meets World.

New additions to the Disney + library have appeared relatively quickly since the service started. 5 to 10 tracks are added every week – usually on a Friday. This content includes everything from fresh episodes of the original series to classic films and TV shows that were first added to the Disney + library.

As for Disney + Originals, The Mandalorian is the flagship of the service, but there's also plenty of entertainment in the reality series The World, according to Jeff Goldblum and family-friendly competition shows like Shop Class and Be Our Chef series. On the film side, the Disney + original features Star Girl and Timmy Failure are clever, but not necessarily a must.

Disney knows its audience, and newer original series like Prop Culture and Disney Gallery take audiences behind the scenes of some of the studio's most popular franchises and add another level of entertainment to some of the service's most popular content.

Several new Star Wars and Marvel series are just around the corner, but most will be available in late 2020 at the earliest (and possibly later due to production delays due to the pandemic). In contrast, Netflix has hundreds of original series and thousands of films. So it is certainly a debate between quality and quantity.

Our opinion

Disney seems to have spent more time securing content for its new streaming service than designing its user interface, but it has come a long way since the early days of its launch. Disney managers know that the allure of all of these legendary shows and films is hard to miss for a monthly fee less than what you'd pay to rent two films for the evening.

Is there a better alternative?

There is much. They have Netflix, Hulu (which can be bundled with Disney +), Amazon, HBO Max, Apple TV + and the list goes on. What Disney brings is something nobody else has, and that's the real genius of Disney + (and the impetus behind the streaming wars). It is something of a hostage situation. You have it, we want it. And it's very affordable right now.

How long it will take?

The new Disney streamer is going nowhere – the mega-studio will be there in the long run. In addition, I expect this service to continue to improve as Disney finds its way into the streaming world. Expect more features and fewer errors over time.

Should you buy it

If you love Disney, you want Disney +. If you love even one or two of these franchise companies, Disney + makes sense for cost reasons. However, if you're only interested in The Mandalorian to see what all the fuss is about and what's not particularly related to one of the Disney franchise companies, you can sign up for a month at any time, sign up through the best Sneak a show and get started Back to your favorite streaming services until season 2 is available. The decision likely depends on how much you value access to the Disney vault.

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