Published on 12/6/2018
Valentine's Day is approaching fast, and if you're reading this guide that means one of two things. Either you're excited to make your loved one's day and are looking for the perfect gift to do that, or February 14 is a few days away and you have no idea what you're going to do about it. Either way, you've come to the right place.
We live most of our lives with the help of this or that gadget, meaning your partner doesn't need to be a geek for a tech gift to be just right. Wading through all the products at the tech department can be intimidating, but we're here to make it simple with the best gift ideas for 10 different gadget categories.
A special phone for your special someone: Honor View20
A special phone for
your special someone:
Honor View20
Let's not kid ourselves; phones have become the control centres of our lives. Given this, it'd be unkind to let your loved one have an old, outdated control centre, would it not?
The View20 is the latest phone from Honor. It has a beautiful 6.4-inch, 2310x1080-pixel display and is powered by a blazing-fast Kirin 980 processor. Boosted by a Dual-NPU (neural processing unit), the View20 packs serious horsepower -- much more than you'll find in any similarly-priced phone.
Plus, the Honor View20's Magic UI 2.0.1 operating system is compatible with Android 9.0 Pie. That's not something you expect from phones at this price.
It's not all about performance though, as the View20 has an artsy side too. On the rear is a crazy camera combination of a SONY IMX586 48-megapixel sensor with a TOF 3D camera, which can collect information on the shapes of objects based upon the time-of-flight of light signals to enable depth sensing, skeletal tracking and real-time motion capture. The front-facing camera is no slouch either, with 24 megapixels of its own. Your partner's social media profiles are about to get much clearer.
The View20 also serves as a perfect gift for that special fashionista in your life. Honor has paired with Moschino for a special range. The star here is the Moschino co-designed Honor View20 phone, but the luxury fashion house also helped design a phone case and handbag to go along with it.
A laptop for a person on the go: Dell XPS 13
A laptop for a
person on the go:
Dell XPS 13
Some people prefer to do their work at a designated workstation on a desktop PC. Others like to take their work with them wherever they go with a portable, powerful laptop. If the latter description sounds like your partner in crime, the Dell XPS 13 is for them.
Dell's XPS 13 has been CNET's favourite ultraportable Windows laptop for years now, and a new redesign introduced in 2018 only solidified its lead. The XPS13 can be configured with a blazing fast 8th-generation Intel i7 processor, and its Full-HD 1,920x1,080-pixel display looks even more beautiful thanks to the laptop being almost without bezels.
What makes the XPS 13 ideal for productivity users is its weight, or lack thereof, and battery life. The XPS13 weighs just 1.2kg, and at its thickest point is a super svelte 15mm. It achieves that design without sacrificing power, storage capacity (256GB) or, crucially, battery life. CNET's battery testing found the i5-model Dell XPS13 lasted over 12 hours, making it a leader in the category.
A premium gift, without the premium price tag: Honor 8X
A premium gift,
without the premium price tag:
Honor 8X
Buying phones for a loved one can be scary, especially because of their pricetag. Some recent smart phones can be up to $1,799. The Honor 8X asks a simple question: Why pay close to two grand when you can get a killer phone for under $500.
What's most remarkable about the Honor 8X is how little it sacrifices in the way of premium features despite this low price. It has a massive 6.5-inch, 2,340x,1,080-pixel Full-HD display but, thanks to there being practically no bezel, it doesn't feel too big to hold.
On the rear you'll find the fingerprint scanner and a 20 megapixel + 2 megapixel dual-camera photo, which is augmented by AI smarts, while the selfie shooter up front packs 16 megapixels. The processor running the show is a 2.2GHz octa-core Kirin 710, and the phone also has 6GB of RAM. In other words, it's really fast. Who said big-screen phones couldn't have a small price?
The gift of music. Really good quality music: Bose QuietComfort 35 II
The gift of music.
Really good quality music:
Bose QuietComfort 35 II
Everybody loves music, but some people really love music. Bose QuietComfort 35 II's retail for $350 USD (£330, $500 AUD) but that price gets you a magnificent set of headphones that can satisfy an audiophiliac.
Most expensive headphones are either exceptionally comfortable or produce exceptional sound. The wireless, noise cancelling-equipped Bose QuietComfort 35 II has both of those qualities, making it, well, exceptional. It also has 20 hours of battery life with noise cancelling activated, which is impressive.
The QuietComfort 35 II separates itself from its predecessor with Google Assistant integration, which is achieved through a nifty Action button. Press it in and Google Assistant will activate on your connected phone. From there you can ask what the weather is like, what the news is or any number of increasingly sophisticated questions.
The QuietComfort II holds the honour of being the first headphone with this feature, but voice commands aren't for everyone. If you're not interested in Google Assistant, the Action button can be remapped to toggle noise-cancellation levels. Luxury features for a luxury headphone.
Gaming: Nintendo Switch
Gaming:
Nintendo Switch
Even for a company known for bouncing back, Nintendo's console comeback has been astonishing. The Wii U didn't manage to catch on, but the gaming giant's latest console, the Nintendo Switch, is now the hottest console in gaming.
It's not all hype either, as there's plenty of substance to be found in the Switch's gaming library. Does your partner love to lose themselves in video game worlds? Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will easily give them 100 hours-worth of content to do so. Are they a bit more on the casual side? Super Mario Odyssey is a pick-up-and-play masterpiece. Interested in gaming's biggest phenomenon? Fortnite is available on-the-go on the Switch.
The Switch can be played both as a handheld device or, through connecting to a dock, on a TV or monitor. Similarly, the included Joy-Con can be used both as one controller or split into two. This all makes out-of-the-box multiplayer possible.
And after all, isn't a Valentine's Day with some competitive Mario Kart tournaments a Valentine's Day well spent?
Phone for the selfie lover: Honor 10 Lite
Phone for the selfie lover:
Honor 10 Lite
Candlelit dinners and the love of a life partner are great, but we all know what Valentine's Day is really about. Instagram selfies.
The Honor 10 Lite is very much the phone for selfie lovers. Other than its design, its most impressive feature is the 24 megapixel front facing camera. To further ensure selfie success, the Honor 10 Lite packs AI software that can recognise and accentuate 8 different scenarios (greenery, blue sky and so on), as well as 5 different 3D portrait lighting options.
Just as importantly, the Honor 10 Lite looks and feels about much more expensive than its very reasonable price tag. Available in four dazzling gradient-colour variations (two gradient colors – sky blue and shiny red, and two other colors – sapphire blue and midnight black), it has a 2340x1080-pixel, 6.21-inch display with a 90 percent screen-to-body ratio.
On the inside is a Kirin 710 CPU and up to 6GB of RAM and 64GB storage, and on the back is a 13 megapixel + 2 megapixel dual-camera combo. All of this makes the Honor 10 Lite both an economically and photographically incredible gift choice.
rack your increasing heart beat on Valentine's Day: Fitbit Versa
rack your increasing heart
beat on Valentine's Day:
Fitbit Versa
Valentine's Day is a time for celebration, but what about the day after? For some, it's back to a strict diet and exercise regime. If your special someone is focused on counting calories and tracking their health they'll find valuable help in Fitbit Versa.
Heart rate tracker? Check. Sleep tracker? Yep. Waterproof? You better believe it. With the ability to track over 15 exercise modes, calorie intake, calorie expenditure and sleep habits, the Fitbit Versa has all the features needed for a reliable health tracker, plus some useful bonuses.
If your partner is earlier on in their fitness journey the Versa has their back with on-screen workout guides. It can also store over 300 songs for local music playing, has a wide range of third-party apps, NFC payment support and, crucially, over 4 days of battery life.
Best of all, the Versa is affordable. Selling for $199 USD (£199 or $299 AUD), it's cheaper than competing devices like the Apple Watch or Fitbit's own Ionic.
Oh, and also, it tells the time.
Paint me like one of your French girls: iPad 9.7-inch
Paint me like one of
your French girls:
iPad 9.7-inch
While Apple's new line of iPhones may be out of financial reach for some, its newest 9.7-inch iPad starts at a very reasonable $329 USD (£319, $469 AUD). It's an especially good gift if your partner is the artsy type.
The iPad, the sixth generation of Apple's popular tablet, is equipped with Apple Pencil support. The Apple Pencil is a pressure-sensitive stylus (sold separately) that lets you take notes or draw on the iPad with incredible accuracy. Its name is highly apt: Using the Apple Pencil feels surprisingly like a good ol' fashion pad and pen(cil).
Even if your loved one isn't looking for a tablet on which to sketch their next masterpiece, there's a lot to love about the iPad. It's an Apple device, which means it has a gorgeous Retina screen, the intuitive iOS operating system and a best-in-class design.
The much pricier iPad Pro is more of a laptop replacement, thanks to the option to accessorise with a clip-on keyboard. But, excellent as a general purpose tablet for reading, Netflixing and chilling, the iPad is a layup of a gift.
Perfect for your 4K rom com movie nights: LG OLED C8 TV
Perfect for your 4K
rom com movie nights:
LG OLED C8 TV
There are two scenarios in which buying a TV for your partner as a Valentine's Day gift can be justified. The first is that you've got some extra money to throw around and you want to celebrate the day as spectacularly as possible. The second is that you want to buy a gift for your partner that doubles as a gift for yourself.
Whether you're treating your partner or yourself with a new TV, LG's OLED C8 is the most impressive TV CNET has tested. It's absolutely astonishing.
The main advantage offered by LG's OLED technology is perfect black levels. These, in turn, make everything in the picture more dynamic. Combine this with accurate colour, wide viewing angles, stunning 4K resolution and HDR support (for both HDR10 and Dolby Vision), and the picture quality is truly as good as it gets.
The LG OLED C8 range is available in three sizes, starting at the 55-inch model, the 65-inch, through to the massive 77-inch for those with a little extra to spend. The premium cost affords premium features, like a motion-controlled remote (similar to a Nintendo Wii Remote) and a super thin design roughly as thick as your smartphone.
Oh, and also, it tells the time.
A cute companion to bring the Valentine's Day smiles: Anki Vector
A cute companion to bring
the Valentine's Day smiles:
Anki Vector
Are robots going to end up taking over mankind? Probably. If those robots are as cute as Vector, though, we may just be OK with that.
Designed by Anki and originally appearing Kickstarter, Vector is a diminutive robot companion inspired by science fiction icons like R2-D2. The little fella (yep, he’s a dude) is powered by a Qualcomm processor, the same brand you’ll find in Samsung Galaxy and Google Pixel phones, and has a 120-degree HD camera as well as a small IPS screen.
This tech allows Anki to pack quite the bag of tricks. Once you introduce yourself he’ll be able to register your face and will call you by name when he recognises you. He can also take photos of you, play games with you and connect to the internet to answer a range of questions. Thanks to recent Amazon Alexa integration, he can also be used to voice command smartphone tech.
Anki costs $249 USD (£249.99, $449.99 AUD), and is cute enough to charm even the most jaded Valentine’s Day cynic come February 14.
