It has been weeks since the coronavirus brought our lives to a halt, shutting down schools, offices and gyms. Stuck at home, we have had nothing but time to reflect on the things that matter. Consumer technology — most of it, anyway — is low on the list.
That’s right. I’m admitting that many of the high-tech innovations I regularly cover in this column — from foldable smartphones to doorbell cameras — are excessive, even if they are kind of neat. In a crisis, our most important tech — what we have turned to again and again — has boiled down to a few basic items and services:
- Computing devices with access to work tools and a browser.
- Communication tools to stay connected with our loved ones and colleagues.
- Entertainment to keep us from losing our minds.
- An internet connection to let us do all of the above.
When you think about it, that’s all the tech we truly need even when there is no pandemic. That’s actually a nice revelation.
Net connection
A few weeks ago, a neighbour texted me questions about Internet speeds. We use the same internet provider but his connection was much slower than mine.
So I asked him what router he owned. It turned out to be a seven-year-old model that used outdated wireless technology. I encouraged him to replace it, and after some hesitation he bought a new one. His Internet connection became blazing fast.
The lesson: Put time and money into maintaining your Internet infrastructure. Ask your Internet provider about sluggish speeds. If that doesn’t help, check your router and consider upgrading.
Communication tools
Zoom, the easy-to-use videoconferencing service, surged in popularity in the pandemic. But our sudden adoption of Zoom led to discoveries of the product’s weak security, which could have allowed attackers to hijack our web cameras, among other privacy snafus. It also revealed that many of us were unprepared and hadn’t picked a set of robust communication tools.
The lesson: Now is a good time to work with our families, friends and colleagues to decide what communication tools fulfil our needs while respecting our privacy. Try to choose messaging and video-chat apps from respected brands.
For me, they’re Signal and FaceTime for messaging and video chats with friends and family, and Slack and Google Hangouts for collaboration with my colleagues. Some of these apps take extra security measures to encrypt our communications, while others have strong track records of protecting our data from hackers.
Entertainment
So many people are streaming video in the pandemic that in Europe, Netflix and YouTube were pushed to temporarily stream videos in lower-quality formats. Nintendo’s Switch games console is also practically impossible to find, because the game Animal Crossing: New Horizons, a Nintendo exclusive, has offered us a sweet escape from reality.
We all obviously care about entertainment: We are spending hundreds of dollars a year on digital subscriptions, including video and music streaming services.
The lesson: This is a good excuse to treat ourselves. Buy a device that is good at delivering your entertainment, like a $350 to $1,000 TV from TCL or Sony, or a $92 Bluetooth speaker from Ultimate Ears.
Computing device
This item is last on the list because it’s the most obvious. The pandemic has highlighted the importance of the devices we use for work: our smartphones and computers.
The lesson: Because these are the tools that make us productive, we should invest in high-quality devices. The good news is that there is such a vast selection of smartphones and computers that you can buy great devices without spending extraordinary amounts of money. Roughly $400 will buy you a good Android device or iPhone, and a decent computer costs as little as $500.
I’m a fan of Google’s $400 Pixel 3A smartphone and Apple’s $330 entry-level iPad, which can be turned into a great budget laptop by attaching a keyboard.
`Whatever setup you choose, keep it minimal. The more tech you own, the more devices you will have to troubleshoot.