ICYMI: the week's 7 biggest tech new stories from Marshall's great new
speaker to Fitbit's major outage

Date:
Sat, 19 Jul 2025 07:00:00 +0000

Description:
Here are the biggest tech news stories from Nintendo, Fitbit, OpenAI, Marshall, and more for July 19, 2025.

FULL STORY ======================================================================

We've had quite the week this week, so to help you catch up on all the latest tech news, we have this handy one-stop guide to the seven biggest stories of the past seven days.

From Elmo getting hacked to ChatGPT Agent arriving on the scene, we have your firmware update for it all.

And once you're up to speed, be sure to read our guide to the 7 new movies
and TV shows to watch this weekend (July 18). 7. Marshalls new Bluetooth speaker rocked our world (Image credit: Future)

Weve been testing the new Marshall Kilburn III, and our reviewer Harry Padoan had a lot of positive things to say.

The Marshall Kilburn III plates up a delicious meal, composed of
well-seasoned audio, meaty features and a beautiful presentation, adding,
with a 50-hour battery life, youll barely ever need to charge it.

Though he did also highlight some faults, which is why it was half a star off a perfect five-star score, namely that its pricier and maybe not as rugged as some might hope. Read more: Our Marshall Kilburn III review 6. We watched Stranger Things Season 5s trailer

The first trailer for Stranger Things season 5 is finally here.

And if youve been worried about spoilers, series co-creator Ross Duffer
shared that this first trailer pulls from every episode except 7, but its mostly Volume One and just barely scratches the surface.

Season 5 is being split into three parts, and this trailer is mostly taking clips from the first drop coming on November 26, so it shouldnt give too much of the game away. Read more: Stranger Things season 5 trailer launch as it happened 5. Fitbit went down with sync and login issues (Image credit:
Future)

Fitbit users were left high and dry this week, as a huge spike in
Downdetector reports heralded a big outage for Fitbit's mobile app and web API, leaving Fitbit users unable to sync their devices. When the Fitbit Help Center steps were followed, users ended up locked out of their accounts.

Fortunately, Google soon resolved the issue and reached out to us to confirm that a fix was in progress. However, it's not worked for everyone: there is still what seems to be a relatively small percentage of users who are left high and dry, unable to effectively use their devices. S

ome of them have reached out to us via email, while others have taken to Reddit to voice their displeasure and warn other users. One poor Reddit
poster has even seemingly lost all their data since 2018! Read more: Here's what happened during Fitbit's "major outage" 4. Elmo got hacked and taught us a lesson (Image credit: Getty Images)

The Twitter account for the lovable fuzzy red Muppet was hacked this week and proceeded to spew several deeply offensive posts onto the platform.

Arguments aside that those kinds of posts are maybe more at home on Elon
Musks rendition of the social media platform than Elmos usual messages of
love and hugs, the hack reminded us why two-factor authentication is so important.

Its not a completely foolproof solution, but it can make it significantly
less likely your account will get taken over. Read more: Don't be like Elmo, turn on 2FA 3. ChatGPT Agent entered the game (Image credit: OpenAI)

Sam Altman, OpenAI CEO, has just announced the latest addition to ChatGPT.
Its called ChatGPT Agent, and its designed to perform tasks for you, no
matter how complicated. If you can do it online, then ChatGPT Agent can get
it done.

The entire concept is a unified agent that can handle the legwork, make informed decisions about which websites to use, and navigate the web independently. Think about things like planning a wedding, booking your car
in for a service, making an app to solve a problem, or planning and booking a holiday. ChatGPT Agent can do it all, and you can even watch it work if you want to.

If youre a Plus, Teams, or Pro user, then you can click Agent right from the tools drop-down menu to use the new tool. The Agent uses its own virtual computer to perform its tasks, starting by setting up its desktop
environment, and then proceeds to understand the prompt youve given it and gather the necessary information. It will sometimes ask for more information or a clarifying question. Read more: The autonomous AI promises to handle every click and open tab in your browser 2. We went bananas for Donkey Kong (Image credit: Nintendo)

While interest at its announcement was somewhat tepid, it turns out Donkey Kong Bananza is the greatest Nintendo Switch 2 title to date, according to Dashiell Wood, one of our expert game reviewers.

Thats because the title harnesses the powerful Nintendo Switch 2 hardware to offer a gigantic, open-ended world with dazzling destruction that lets you bash, smash, and crash through practically anything. Read More: Our full Donkey Kong Bananza review 1. Google set a date for its Pixel phone drop (Image credit: Twelve South)

The eagerly anticipated Mage by Google product launch event will happen on August 20 at 10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm BST / 3am AEST, and it looks to be a product-packed event.

We're expecting not only the Pixel 10 phone line (so the Pixel 10, Pixel 10 Pro, and Pixel 10 Pro XL), but a new Pixel 10 Pro Fold, which now has a tough act to follow given the 4.2mm-thick Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 . At least
they'll both be running Android 16.

A new, possibly redesigned, Pixel Watch 4 is also expected, but we don't have many details for no,w so well have to wait a little longer to have an idea what Google has up its sleeve. Read more: We're getting Made By Google in August



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/tech/icymi-the-weeks-7-biggest-tech-new-stories-from -marshalls-great-new-speaker-to-fitbits-major-outage


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