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During Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked 2025 event, its SmartThings division unveiled new AI technology that could be set to supercharge the smart-home experience – provided that you have a Samsung-based ecosystem, that is.

The new tools will fall under the banner of Samsung's Home AI, and include 'ambient sensing', a feature that gathers insights from connected devices around your home and adapts to your everyday life to make your smart home more efficient.

We don't have a confirmed release date yet, other than a broad 2025-2026 rollout window, which means there's plenty of time to kit your smart home out with SmartThings-enabled hardware; just bear in mind that it's likely most features will be exclusive to Samsung's devices, at least in the short term.

Here are the answers to all your burning questions…

What is ambient sensing?

Chief among these new developments is ambient sensing, whereby SmartThings devices will be able to leverage advanced sensor technology such as motion and sound detection to monitor your daily activities and create the perfect environment for every moment.

Many of Samsung's devices feature such sensors, from the new Bespoke JetBot Combo AI robot vacuum to Samsung's large appliances and the Samsung Music Frame, meaning you just might already have a few devices in your home that will benefit from the new ambient sensor technology.

What will Samsung's ambient sensing do?

Samsung provided a few examples of what its ambient sensing technology will be capable of:

• Human Detection and Activity Monitoring: SmartThings will be able to use sensors to detect different activities like push-ups, sleeping, or even working at your desk. This information will be used to recommend better routines and improve your environment.
• Health Insight and Lifestyle Recommendations: It's not just your devices that SmartThings will adjust; to help you keep healthy, SmartThings will provide real-time feedback such as reminding you to move around if you've been sitting for too long.

So what might this look like in practice? For example, while you're working out, Samsung says SmartThings will be able to detect which kind of exercise you’re doing, offering guidance on your form and giving recommendations for how to up your gains by changing the length of exercise.

If you've just hopped in the shower, the sound and motion made as you dry your hair could trigger your robot vacuum to collect any hair you shed in the process, or create a more ambient mood as you approach your favorite reading chair by switching on the nearby lamp and adjusting the room's temperature.

Or, if you've got a particularly fluffy friend at home that emits wafts of fur as it jumps up on furniture, SmartThings could even recognize this and activate your air purifier to remove allergens from the air.

Indeed, it's a development I discussed with a number of executives at CES 2025, though I couldn't quite get a sense for how soon these features might manifest; now I know, and I'm delighted that it's set to happen so much sooner than I'd anticipated.

Generative AI Map View

The fun doesn't stop there; SmartThings is also set to upgrade its AI Home arsenal with Generative AI technology, namely by adding further personalization to your Map View.

Now, Samsung says you'll be able to use your phone camera to capture images of furnishings around your home to make Map View more accurate to your styling.

That in turn means you'll have a better user experience when it comes to navigating around and interacting with your smart home, as Map View will know where your furniture is, and be capable of leveraging the new ambient sensing technology based on proximity.

Will SmartThings keep my home data secure?

The short answer is, Samsung says, yes.

The longer answer is that Samsung will store all information locally on your network, offering privacy by keeping the data within Samsung's appliances and devices instead of being dependent on the cloud. That means, Samsung says, that your data won't be accessible to third parties without your consent.

Samsung is, frankly, light years ahead of its smart home competition, owing to its combination of wide-ranging product categories across home and lifestyle devices, its worldwide popularity, and its various partnerships with the likes of Google for its AI tools as well as its collaboration with the Connectivity Standards Alliance on Matter.

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Samsung’s first Galaxy Unpacked event was packed, and keeping with the brand's tradition, it went through all of its news in a zippy fashion. The Galaxy S25, S25 Plus, and S25 Ultra were all made official, alongside deeper partnerships with Google for new Gemini tricks, a bevy of new Galaxy AI features, major improvements to content creation, and a tease of what the company is cooking up with Google for its Android XR headset.

It was a lot, and while you can read through our live blog of the event – including on-the-ground moments captured by the TechRadar team – here we’re sharing the nine most significant things we learned from the January 22, 2025, Galaxy Unpacked.

And it all starts with, you guessed it, AI.

1. Galaxy AI is getting even smarter and more personalized

(Image credit: Samsung)

Just like the Galaxy S24 family, the S25 is all about Galaxy AI, and for 2025, Samsung is doubling down on the performance of these features and their breadth. It starts with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset, which comes with 12GB of RAM and a dedicated core for AI tasks dubbed the Personal Data Engine.

The idea here is that inside the S25, S25 Plus, and S25 Ultra is a core that can be dedicated to handling AI tasks, and eventually create a sort of personalized LLM for you. One that can learn your habits and the other devices you have and serve helpful AI – in the form of Bixby, Gemini, or the new Now Brief functionality – to help you get things done faster or complete them for you without you needing to do much.

Samsung wants its devices to do more for you – not just the latest Galaxy phone, but other devices within the ecosystem too, such as a Galaxy Ring, Watch, or even a connected appliance. Ideally, it could turn off your TV for you when your watch tells your phone that you’re asleep, or it could make a recommendation to turn on a sleep mode to let you stop doom scrolling on TikTok and put the phone down.

2. The Galaxy S25 Ultra aims to deliver the complete package

(Image credit: Future / Roland Moore-Colyer)

The headline hardware announcement from Galaxy Unpacked was the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, aka Samsung’s biggest, baddest new flagship smartphone.

At first glance, it doesn’t look too dissimilar to its predecessor, but there are some important design differences worth mentioning. For starters, the S25 Ultra has much bolder camera rings, which now look more like they do on the Galaxy Z Fold 6, and are consistent across the entire Galaxy S25 lineup. The new phone has a slightly bigger display than the S24 Ultra too; it now measures 6.9 inches, up from 6.8 inches on last year’s model, which is an increase made possible by a 15% thinner bezel.

The S25 Ultra is also thinner than its predecessor more generally, and it weighs 15g less, but the biggest difference comes to the corners, which are now rounded rather than sharp (iPhone fans, rejoice).

Under the hood, Samsung’s latest flagship boasts a For Galaxy version of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, which is more powerful than the S24 Ultra’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset and should deliver even better gaming and AI performance. Speaking of which, the S25 Ultra gets a larger vapor-cooling chamber than its predecessor, and you’ll also get instant access to some new Galaxy AI features like Now Brief and Audio Eraser.

For our first impressions of this new best Android phone contender, check out our hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra review. Your move, Google and Apple!

@techradar

Meet the Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus: same great design, beware chip and more AI!

♬ original sound - TechRadar 3. The Galaxy S25 and S25 Plus step things up in terms of value

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

Compared to the Ultra, this year’s new standard models aren’t all that exciting, but they are objectively better than their predecessors and come with a host of future-facing upgrades.

Design-wise, you’re looking at the same fancy new camera rings as on the Galaxy S25 Ultra, and both the Galaxy S25 and Galaxy S25 Plus are 7% thinner than last year’s models.

The big news for these two phones is the RAM capacity: it’s now 12GB instead of 8GB, which brings both models in line with the S25 Ultra, and all three new devices also share the same Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset. There’s no Qualcomm/Exynos split this year, which will come as good news for European buyers.

Other hardware upgrades for the S25 include a larger vapor-cooling chamber, which should facilitate better gaming performance alongside that 8 Elite chipset, and on the software front you’ll get instant access to several new Galaxy AI features.

For an early look at both devices, check out our hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 review and hands-on Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus review.

4. The Galaxy S25 Edge is official, and it’s crazy thin

(Image credit: Future)

While the phone rumor mill has been talking about an iPhone 17 Air for quite some time, Samsung beat the Cupertino-based tech giant to the punch. Just like it teased the Galaxy Ring at the end of the January 2024 Unpacked, Samsung closed out this year's Unpacked with a glimpse of an ultra-thin smartphone.

The Galaxy S25 Edge shows various components stacking together in a shockingly slim build for a phone that seemingly promises the Galaxy AI powers of the rest of the S25 lineup in an ultra-light build. We got to see it from afar at Galaxy Unpacked, and yes, it’s crazy, and super thin, but still has room for a main camera bump and seems to boast matt titanium sides.

Of course, nothing more than a quick look and a name was made official, but the minute Samsung gives us more information on the Galaxy S25 Edge, we’ll be sure to update you.

@techradar

♬ original sound - TechRadar 5. We got another look at Samsung and Google’s Project Moohan headset

(Image credit: Lance Ulanoff / Future)

Google and Samsung formally unveiled the Project Moohan Android XR mixed-reality headset in December of 2024, but it wouldn’t have been an Unpacked without a tease, right? It was only a brief mention, but Samsung did indeed show off a fresh look at the forthcoming headset.

The two brands are still partnering on the Android XR platform, but also on the headset poised to deliver a complete range of XR experiences with eye- and hand-tracking. Samsung again confirmed the headset is in the works, though nothing more concrete was shared except that it will integrate with the existing Samsung ecosystem.

Separately, speaking to Bloomberg, Samsung’s TM Roh confirmed that the brand is also working on glasses with Google, and that the two companies want to ship them as soon as they’re ready. It's safe to say AR, XR, and smart glasses are still heating up.

@techradar

♬ original sound - TechRadar 6. You’ll get 6 months of Gemini Advanced with an S25, S25 Plus, or S25 Ultra

(Image credit: Lance Ulanoff / Future)

Considering Samsung highlighted a number of new Gemini features during Galaxy Unpacked, it’s only right that folks ordering the Galaxy S25, S25 Plus, or S25 Ultra are getting a freebie. With the purchase of Samsung’s latest flagship, you’ll get six months of Gemini Advanced at no additional cost, which should let you use all the phone's AI capabilities to the fullest without worrying about limits.

The deal also stretches the value of the Galaxy S25 lineup; Gemini Advanced is $19.99 a month in the United States, so a six-month subscription is just short of $120 in value.

7. The S25 series phones are getting the iPhone and Pixel’s best camera features

(Image credit: Samsung)

The race for the title of best camera phone is going to be tight again in 2025, with Samsung revealing that its S25 clan will get some powerful features we’ve mostly seen from Apple and Google before now.

That includes the ability to shoot log video (which is ideal for color grading) and Samsung’s take on Google’s Best Take for Pixels, which it’s calling Best Face. That’s ideal if your group shots usually contain someone with unfortunate blinking timing.

If you prefer to tweak and color-grade your still photos, there’s also an equivalent of Apple’s Photographic Styles. This lets you select a picture and create a filter based on its look, before fine-tuning its white balance, saturation, and grain.

Interestingly, a demo of Gemini Live showed a presenter getting some photo editing tips from an AI assistant by talking to them about their dog photo. Snaps of your furry friend will never have poor composition again.

8. Samsung’s SmartThings ecosystem is getting new AI tools

(Image credit: Samsung)

While it wasn’t a huge portion of the keynote, SmartThings had its moment in the sun with the official announcement of new ambient sensing technology and Generative AI Map View tools to help you personalize your smart home, all under the banner of Home AI.

Ambient sensing is arguably the most exciting feature, marking the first ecosystem-wide sensor-based technology that will allow your smart home devices not only to detect where you are and what you’re doing, but also optimize your environment accordingly.

Doing some press-ups? Well, your refrigerator might just be watching you, ready to give personalized tips on how to improve your form, or suggest adjustments to the duration of your workout.

While the second update might sound less exciting, it’s actually part of how ambient sensing can be made even more effective. Samsung’s new Gen AI Map View will allow you to photograph and upload your real furnishings into Map View, meaning your Home AI will not only know where the furniture is, but also what the furniture is. This is already somewhat possible with the Bespoke JetBot Combo AI robot vacuum, but Gen AI Map View will open the gates for even more personalization and detail.

Given that Samsung is already discussing its vision of bringing devices like the Samsung Galaxy Ring and even SmartTag 2 into the SmartThings fold, it’s not hard to imagine just how intelligent your Samsung smart home might be about to become.

Both ambient sensing and Gen AI Map View are set to roll out throughout 2025 and 2026.

9. There might be a Samsung tri-fold phone in the future

(Image credit: Future)

Before closing out the keynote with the Galaxy S25 Edge, Samsung showed off what looked like a roadmap that included a tri-fold phone.

While Samsung didn't share anything further, it likely shows where Samsung is heading with its foldable smartphone lineup. We already have the Flip and Fold, but there will need to be a new form factor to push the category further and deliver something new. It seems that tri-fold is that build type, and Samsung might ship it sooner than we expected.

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• Finnish retailer has posted a release date for RTX 5070 Ti
• The Nvidia GPU is supposedly set to arrive on February 20
• With no mention of a date attached to the RTX 5070, this might fuel other rumors that this vanilla graphics card could slide to March

Nvidia’s RTX 5070 Ti hasn’t been given an official release date beyond February, but a European retailer has revealed when it thinks the GPU will go on sale – namely February 20.

Add your own salt now, but the retailer is Proshop over in Finland (which recently aired purported details on third-party RTX 5080 pricing, too), and it has that on-sale date for all of the many third-party RTX 5070 Ti graphics cards that it'll be selling.

With the RTX 5090 and 5080 hitting shelves on January 30, that would theoretically mean a three-week gap between these higher-end graphics cards, and the mid-range Blackwell offering, going on sale.

I was hoping for a smaller gap between these launches, as it’s the mid-range I have my eye on for my PC upgrade early this year. Although as ever, we must be skeptical about any retailer leak such as this, as Proshop could have wrong or outdated info, or might just be guessing and have shoved in a placeholder date. And to be clear, Team Green has so far only told us the GPU will arrive in February.

(Image credit: Nvidia) Analysis: One date present, one date missing

What’s interesting to note is that while the RTX 5070 Ti has had this date of February 20 attached to the GPU, the vanilla RTX 5070 hasn’t. Proshop hasn’t pinned a date on this lower-tier flavor yet.

Does that mean anything? Well, maybe not (and we can’t even assume the date means anything for the RTX 5070 Ti either). However, dropping into indulgence mode here, I guess it’s possible to read it as a hint that the RTX 5070 could be further out. If that GPU was arriving before February 20, or on that day as well, it seems likely Proshop would’ve displayed that too. If it’s later and still to be confirmed, the retailer would just leave it blank, as it has done.

It's also worth bearing in mind that we’ve just reported on a rumor that fits with this line of speculation. Namely that the RTX 5070 Ti is apparently set to arrive mid-to-late February, which February 20 matches up with nicely – and furthermore, that the RTX 5070 might not go on sale until early March.

Granted, I feel the latter rumor remains very tenuous, and I’d strongly caution against going too far with this idea right now. But it’s not unthinkable that the RTX 5070 might turn up later than the RTX 5070 Ti, and there’s been a rumor in the past that this is the plan.

It’s quite possible that Nvidia hasn’t made the final decision yet, and is still waiting to make a definitive call, which is (of course) why we weren’t treated to any specific dates at CES 2025 beyond just February.

Whatever the case, I hope the RTX 5070 makes the cut for late February, as promised, rather than sliding to March (and Nvidia will surely want this too – as the latter scenario means a direct clash with AMD’s RX 9070 GPUs, rather than getting out ahead of them).

Via VideoCardz

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Buffalo has introduced a new USB flash drive, the RUF3-KEV (via PC Watch, originally in Japanese), designed to provide physical security against malware and virus infections.

The USB 3.2 Gen 1 drive comes with in-built endpoint protection, the "DiXiM Security Endpoint," a security service that continuously monitors files saved or updated on the USB drive for any signs of infection.

This is in addition to a real-time antivirus feature which automatically isolates and removes infected files when detected, and a "heuristic function" that identifies potentially malicious programs by analyzing their behavior.

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Though less eye-catching, the RUF3-KEV also supports password authentication, preventing unauthorized access.

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Samsung has just unveiled its new Galaxy S25 series smartphones at its Galaxy Unpacked event, alongside a slew of brand-new AI features coming to its devices, such as the handy Now Brief. You can check out our coverage here at TechRadar.com including our hands-on thoughts with the new Samsung Galaxy S25, Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus, and Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, and find out more about everything announced via our Galaxy Unpack event liveblog.

But if you want us to truly unpack everything Samsung just revealed, as well as what we think this event means for Samsung as a whole in 2025, then you’ll need to watch our brand-new Samsung Unpacked January 2025 special episode of the TechRadar podcast.

In it, Josie Watson and I are joined by phone expert Axel Metz, fitness tech guru Matt Evans, and as always the wonderfully wise Lance Ulanoff to break down everything we saw so you can get to grips with the latest tech news.

We take a deep dive into the new phones and AI features, give you our thoughts on Samsung’s continued efforts to build an interconnected internet of things ecosystem – which goes beyond anything Apple is currently capable of – and discuss what Samsung needs for Project Moohan and its XR efforts to succeed where others have failed.

You can catch our latest podcast episode via our YouTube channel – or the embedded video above – and you can also check it out on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. You can find all our other episodes there too, including our CES 2025 special.

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• Samsung teased Project Moohan AI capabilities at Galaxy Unpacked
• It also announced exclusive software from third-party app creators
• The presentation was light on the details

Samsung took a few moments – literal seconds – out of its Samsung Galaxy S25 launch event to talk about Project Moohan (its upcoming VR headset) and Android XR, and how the platform will leverage multimodal AI to bring awesome (but currently nebulous) upgrades to XR systems. Thankfully it had more to say in a separate interview with TM Roh, the president of Samsung’s Mobile Experience division, including one detail which makes me believe Samsung’s tech won’t crash and burn like the Apple Vision Pro.

Out the gate we have some bad news courtesy of the interview conducted by Bloomberg (behind a paywall): we still don’t have a release date for Samsung’s headset or AR glasses. Roh did reaffirm the consumer version of Moohan is coming this year, though he didn’t reveal precisely when, or how much it’ll cost at launch.

@techradar

♬ original sound - TechRadar

Roh also added that Samsung is working on AR glasses – though again, he refused to elaborate on when they might launch, just that they would arrive eventually once they reach the quality and readiness Samsung wants (which Roh hopes is “as soon as possible”).

However, the good news is that Samsung and its partner Google seem to have understood their core focus shouldn’t just be hardware, but software too.

An important lesson learned

Roh reportedly said that one key part of launching the XR devices will be having enough exclusive, original, worthwhile content ready for launch. To achieve this goal Samsung and Google are apparently working with third-parties to develop XR software for Android.

Thank goodness.

Samsung is learning from Apple's Mistakes (Image credit: Surreal Interactive)

I’m not the only one to say this, but a huge issue with the Apple Vision Pro’s launch wasn’t intrinsically that it cost $3,500 / £3,499 / AU$5,999, it was that it didn’t justify costing $3,500 / £3,499 / AU$5,999. Sure, it boasted incredible specs, but fundamentally it couldn’t do anything you couldn’t just do with a Mac or iPad and a Meta Quest 3 – pairings that would cost you significantly less. And it could do less than either of those pairings in some ways, because the Quest platform is brimming with exclusive software.

Apple had a couple of impressive exclusives, like its Disney Plus 3D content, but nowhere near enough to compete with the market at the price it attempted to demand. That’s why a year on from its release it just hasn’t had the staying power anyone hoped it might.

TM Roh’s comments at least show Samsung is aware of the importance of software, though given how badly people have been burned previously by other brands, I’m hesitant to take the comments at face value – not until we can see and try the software he’s teasing. Don’t get me wrong, I’m desperate for Samsung to succeed so Meta can face some proper competition – right now, the closest thing we have to a Quest-killer is the rumored Asus Tarius headset (which uses the Quest’s operating system because it’s a collab between Asus and Meta) – but until Samsung and Google show us the goods I’ll remain cautiously optimistic.

For now, we’ll have to make do with Samsung talking the talk, and wait and see if it can walk the walk when it shows us what Project Moohan has in store for us later in 2025.

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