Tech
Gift Guide 2024: The best gadgets for new home owners
In August, I did something I never imagined myself doing: I bought a house. After spending most of my adult life in New York City, I moved a couple of hours north to the Hudson Valley.
It’s been every bit as major an adjustment as I’d expected. Along with your standard new homeowner surprises — like a short-tailed shrew doing short-tailed shrew things in my laundry room — the move from renting to home ownership has brought a level of control I’ve never had over my own space.
For example, I’ve regularly turned down smart home products for review because I couldn’t install things like a smart doorbell in a place I didn’t own. It’s a small thing, perhaps, but I’ve spent much of the last couple of months making up for lost time.
Here’s a gift guide for the person in your life who recently moved — or for yourself, if that applies to you. Everything featured herein is something I’ve tested and currently use myself. Hopefully they’ll make your smart house feel a bit more like a smart home.
Apple Mac Studio/Mac Mini — $1,999/$599
The Mac Studio M2 and a pair of Studio Displays currently serve as the centerpiece of my office. The Studio is a hugely powerful machine in a fairly small package, and the SD card slot on the front is great for all of the photos I need to take for my job.
If asked to make the choice today, however, I might opt for the pint-sized Mac Mini to free up a lot of space on my desk. Certainly the $599 entry point is appealing, as well.
Aviron Interactive Home Rowing Machine — $1,999
I messed up my back last year. Like really, really messed it up. Because of this, I’ve had to give up on my morning runs. Cycling is great, but it’s something I prefer to do on an actual bike. I’ve ultimately landed on rowing, which offers a full body workout with significantly less impact than running.
Aviron isn’t a big name in connected fitness, but the startup has produced a great rower with a clever content library. Rather than simply relying on trainer video, the company built a suite of games designed to engage you as you work out. It’s a fun way to break a sweat.
Beflo Tenon Smart Adjustable Desk — starts at $2,399
Desks are important. Standing is also important. Ergo, standing desks are important. When I moved up from the city, I decided it was time to rid myself of the big, bulky desk I’d purchased second-hand over a decade ago. I wanted to see how the other half lived, so I reached out to Beflo about its over-the-top approach to the category. It’s kind of the Cadillac of standing desks.
The Tenon has all the bells and whistles and a starting price to match. The desk has a mechanical lifting feature controllable via touchscreen or Beflo’s app. There are USB ports and even lights. Honestly, it may well be overkill for a majority of people, but it’s not a bad idea to invest in a desk that should last you a while.
Bird Buddy — $299
I’ve wanted one of these since it was announced, but I’ve never had my own backyard. Bird Buddy is one of the first things I picked out for my new porch. The concept is simple enough: It’s a bird feeder with a camera. Of course, these sorts of products only work when well-implemented, and Bird Buddy brings clever innovations to the table. AI is used to capture videos and snapshots at the right time, and it has been expanding to include things like bird identification.
I will admit that it took a lot of trial and error to implement the system in a way that attracts the desired effects. Greedy squirrels were a challenge, though a conical baffle finally took care of the issue. Beyond that, the secret to Bird Buddy, like any other bird feeder, is patience. It can take birds weeks to find a new feeder. Once they do, however, word travels fast.
Branch Verve Chair — $509
I’ve recommended Branch’s chairs to anyone who asks. The company makes a supremely comfortable desk chair that makes long work days a little more bearable. They also look great.
I recently upgraded from the Ergonomic chair to the Verve — and I can fully recommend either one. The Verve is a bit pricier and nicer. Get a load of that coral color; that’ll break up your home office monotony.
Coway Airmega — $230
In certain parts of the world, air purifiers are a must have. As wildfires seem to get worse every year, that increasingly applies here in the U.S. I’m also a person with a lot of allergies who just moved to the woods, along with a prolifically shedding pet. I can’t say enough about how much a good purifier helps keep my home breathable.
Coway makes a HEPA purifier capable of cleaning up to 361 square feet in just over 12 minutes. Or you can clean up to 874 square feet in half an hour — which, honestly, covers most of my house. It also looks great, with a curved minimalist design you won’t feel like you need to hide when guests come over.
Dyson Gen5 Detect — $949
My Dyson and I have been through a lot. The vacuum has been banged against corners and dropped more times that I care to mention, but it’s still ticking. The biggest challenge of all, however, is a lionhead rabbit that seems to shed 5x her weight in hair every week. The Gen5 Detect is the only thing standing between me and a fur coat floor.
The floors in my new place are mostly hardwood, and the Dyson excels at sucking up particles and even the bits of hay scattered around my floor anytime the rabbit decides she’s mad at me. It handles the rugs equally well.
FoodCycler Eco 3 — $500
Dump your food waste into this $500 countertop appliance, hit Start, and in a couple of hours, everything from potato peels to lobster shells gets ground down into fertilizer for your growing army of houseplants. The FoodCycler is a win-win.
Hisense C2 Ultra Projector — $3,000
Here’s something embarrassing. I tested the Hisense C2 projector right before I had to leave town for a week to go to Disrupt. I found myself missing the experience. Nothing beats going to see a movie in a theater, but this high-end 4K laser projector comes close.
The picture is sharp and stunning, and the built-in speaker is plenty loud and clear. The system ships with a number of popular streaming apps built-in, including Netflix and Disney+. Ultimately, however, I’ve opted to utilize the HDMI port to plug in the Apple TV 4K, while outputting the video to a pair of HomePods. As I write this, I’m really thinking about which foreign horror movie I’m going to stream on the Criterion app tonight.
Nest Learning Thermostat fourth gen — $280
It’s not the most exciting product category, but a good thermostat makes a heap of difference, both for your comfort levels and energy bill. The Nest Learning Thermostat was surprisingly easy to install, speaking as someone without absolutely zero electrical experience.
The new display looks great and offers a lot of information at a glance, but I found that I’ve mostly forgotten it exists. That’s a net positive for a thermostat, the kind of product you only really think about when something’s gone wrong.
Nightside — $350
This was a fantastic housewarming gift from a colleague. Built by a small startup of the same name, Nightside is a warm and tall bedside lamp with an extremely clever track. The top raises up and features an adjustable mirror that reflects a beam of light for reading in bed.
It’s testament to being innovative without being high tech, and it hasn’t left my bedside since.
TP-Link RE715X — $99
If you own a house, you need a range extender. My place is only a little over 1,000 square feet, but I found that roughly half of my rooms weren’t getting good Wi-Fi cover. This little range extender is super easy to set up and plugs directly into the wall.
I went for the dual-band model, and have been happy with the performance, even as my army of smart home products continues to grow.
Tech
Volkswagen’s cheapest EV ever is the first to use Rivian software
Volkswagen’s ultra-cheap EV called the ID EVERY1 — a small four-door hatchback revealed Wednesday — will be the first to roll out with software and architecture from Rivian, according to a source familiar with the new model.
The EV is expected to go into production in 2027 with a starting price of 20,000 euros ($21,500). A second EV called the ID.2all, which will be priced in the 25,000 euro price category, will be available in 2026. Both vehicles are part of the automaker’s new of category electric urban front-wheel drive cars that are being developing under the so-called “Brand Group Core” that makes up the volume brands in the VW Group. And both vehicles are for the European market.
The EVERY1 will be the first to ship with Rivian’s vehicle architecture and software as part of a $5.8 billion joint venture struck last year between the German automaker and U.S. EV maker. The ID.2all is based on the E3 1.1 architecture and software developed by VW’s software unit Cariad.
VW didn’t name Rivian in its reveal Wednesday, although there were numerous nods to next-generation software. Kai Grünitz, member of the Volkswagen Brand Board of Management responsible for Technical Development, noted it would be the first model in the entire VW Group to use a “fundamentally new, particularly powerful software architecture.”
“This means the future entry-level Volkswagen can be equipped with new functions throughout its entire life cycle,” he said. “Even after purchase of a new car, the small Volkswagen can still be individually adapted to customer needs.”
Sources who didn’t want to be named because they were not authorized to speak publicly, confirmed to TechCrunch that Rivian’s software will be in the ID EVERY1 EV. TechCrunch has reached out to Rivian and VW and will update the article if the companies respond.
The new joint venture provides Rivian with a needed influx of cash and the opportunity to diversify its business. Meanwhile, VW Group gains a next-generation electrical architecture and software for EVs that will help it better compete. Both companies have said that the joint venture, called Rivian and Volkswagen Group Technologies, will reduce development costs and help scale new technologies more quickly.
The joint venture is a 50-50 partnership with co-CEOs. Rivian’s head of software, Wassym Bensaid, and Volkswagen Group’s chief technical engineer, Carsten Helbing, will lead the joint venture. The team will be based initially in Palo Alto, California. Three other sites are in development in North America and Europe, the companies have previously said.
“The ID. EVERY1 represents the last piece of the puzzle on our way to the widest model selection in the volume segment,” Thomas Schäfer, CEO of the Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand and Head of the Brand Group Core, said in a statement. “We will then offer every customer the right car with the right drive system–including affordable all-electric entry-level mobility. Our goal is to be the world’s technologically leading high-volume manufacturer by 2030. And as a brand for everyone–just as you would expect from Volkswagen.”
The Volkswagen ID EVERY1 is just a concept for now — and with only a few details attached to the unveiling. The concept vehicle reaches a top speed of 130 km/h (80 miles per hour) and is powered by a newly developed electric drive motor with 70 kW, according to Volkswagen. The German automaker said the range on the EVERY1 will be at least 250 kilometers (150 miles). The vehicle is small but larger than VW’s former UP! vehicle. The company said it will have enough space for four people and a luggage compartment volume of 305 liters.
Tech
The hottest AI models, what they do, and how to use them
AI models are being cranked out at a dizzying pace, by everyone from Big Tech companies like Google to startups like OpenAI and Anthropic. Keeping track of the latest ones can be overwhelming.
Adding to the confusion is that AI models are often promoted based on industry benchmarks. But these technical metrics often reveal little about how real people and companies actually use them.
To cut through the noise, TechCrunch has compiled an overview of the most advanced AI models released since 2024, with details on how to use them and what they’re best for. We’ll keep this list updated with the latest launches, too.
There are literally over a million AI models out there: Hugging Face, for example, hosts over 1.4 million. So this list might miss some models that perform better, in one way or another.
AI models released in 2025
Cohere’s Aya Vision
Cohere released a multimodal model called Aya Vision that it claims is best in class at doing things like captioning images and answering questions about photos. It also excels in languages other than English, unlike other models, Cohere claims. It is available for free on WhatsApp.
OpenAI’s GPT 4.5 ‘Orion’
OpenAI calls Orion their largest model to date, touting its strong “world knowledge” and “emotional intelligence.” However, it underperforms on certain benchmarks compared to newer reasoning models. Orion is available to subscribers of OpenAI’s $200 a month plan.
Claude Sonnet 3.7
Anthropic says this is the industry’s first ‘hybrid’ reasoning model, because it can both fire off quick answers and really think things through when needed. It also gives users control over how long the model can think for, per Anthropic. Sonnet 3.7 is available to all Claude users, but heavier users will need a $20 a month Pro plan.
xAI’s Grok 3
Grok 3 is the latest flagship model from Elon Musk-founded startup xAI. It’s claimed to outperform other leading models on math, science, and coding. The model requires X Premium (which is $50 a month.) After one study found Grok 2 leaned left, Musk pledged to shift Grok more “politically neutral” but it’s not yet clear if that’s been achieved.
OpenAI o3-mini
This is OpenAI’s latest reasoning model and is optimized for STEM-related tasks like coding, math, and science. It’s not OpenAI’s most powerful model but because it’s smaller, the company says it’s significantly lower cost. It is available for free but requires a subscription for heavy users.
OpenAI Deep Research
OpenAI’s Deep Research is designed for doing in-depth research on a topic with clear citations. This service is only available with ChatGPT’s $200 per month Pro subscription. OpenAI recommends it for everything from science to shopping research, but beware that hallucinations remain a problem for AI.
Mistral Le Chat
Mistral has launched app versions of Le Chat, a multimodal AI personal assistant. Mistral claims Le Chat responds faster than any other chatbot. It also has a paid version with up-to-date journalism from the AFP. Tests from Le Monde found Le Chat’s performance impressive, although it made more errors than ChatGPT.
OpenAI Operator
OpenAI’s Operator is meant to be a personal intern that can do things independently, like help you buy groceries. It requires a $200 a month ChatGPT Pro subscription. AI agents hold a lot of promise, but they’re still experimental: a Washington Post reviewer says Operator decided on its own to order a dozen eggs for $31, paid with the reviewer’s credit card.
Google Gemini 2.0 Pro Experimental
Google Gemini’s much-awaited flagship model says it excels at coding and understanding general knowledge. It also has a super-long context window of 2 million tokens, helping users who need to quickly process massive chunks of text. The service requires (at minimum) a Google One AI Premium subscription of $19.99 a month.
AI models released in 2024
DeepSeek R1
This Chinese AI model took Silicon Valley by storm. DeepSeek’s R1 performs well on coding and math, while its open source nature means anyone can run it locally. Plus, it’s free. However, R1 integrates Chinese government censorship and faces rising bans for potentially sending user data back to China.
Gemini Deep Research
Deep Research summarizes Google’s search results in a simple and well-cited document. The service is helpful for students and anyone else who needs a quick research summary. However, its quality isn’t nearly as good as an actual peer-reviewed paper. Deep Research requires a $19.99 Google One AI Premium subscription.
Meta Llama 3.3 70B
This is the newest and most advanced version of Meta’s open source Llama AI models. Meta has touted this version as its cheapest and most efficient yet, especially for math, general knowledge, and instruction following. It is free and open source.
OpenAI Sora
Sora is a model that creates realistic videos based on text. While it can generate entire scenes rather than just clips, OpenAI admits that it often generates “unrealistic physics.” It’s currently only available on paid versions of ChatGPT, starting with Plus, which is $20 a month.
Alibaba Qwen QwQ-32B-Preview
This model is one of the few to rival OpenAI’s o1 on certain industry benchmarks, excelling in math and coding. Ironically for a “reasoning model,” it has “room for improvement in common sense reasoning,” Alibaba says. It also incorporates Chinese government censorship, TechCrunch testing shows. It’s free and open source.
Anthropic’s Computer Use
Claude’s Computer Use is meant to take control of your computer to complete tasks like coding or booking a plane ticket, making it a predecessor of OpenAI’s Operator. Computer use, however, remains in beta. Pricing is via API: $0.80 per million tokens of input and $4 per million tokens of output.
x.AI’s Grok 2
Elon Musk’s AI company, x.AI, has launched an enhanced version of its flagship Grok 2 chatbot it claims is “three times faster.” Free users are limited to 10 questions every two hours on Grok, while subscribers to X’s Premium and Premium+ plans enjoy higher usage limits. x.AI also launched an image generator, Aurora, that produces highly photorealistic images, including some graphic or violent content.
OpenAI o1
OpenAI’s o1 family is meant to produce better answers by “thinking” through responses through a hidden reasoning feature. The model excels at coding, math, and safety, OpenAI claims, but has issues deceiving humans, too. Using o1 requires subscribing to ChatGPT Plus, which is $20 a month.
Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet 3.5
Claude Sonnet 3.5 is a model Anthropic claims as being best in class. It’s become known for its coding capabilities and is considered a tech insider’s chatbot of choice. The model can be accessed for free on Claude although heavy users will need a $20 monthly Pro subscription. While it can understand images, it can’t generate them.
OpenAI GPT 4o-mini
OpenAI has touted GPT 4o-mini as its most affordable and fastest model yet thanks to its small size. It’s meant to enable a broad range of tasks like powering customer service chatbots. The model is available on ChatGPT’s free tier. It’s better suited for high-volume simple tasks compared to more complex ones.
Cohere Command R+
Cohere’s Command R+ model excels at complex Retrieval-Augmented Generation (or RAG) applications for enterprises. That means it can find and cite specific pieces of information really well. (The inventor of RAG actually works at Cohere.) Still, RAG doesn’t fully solve AI’s hallucination problem.
Tech
Not all cancer patients need chemo. Ataraxis AI raised $20M to fix that.
Artificial intelligence is a big trend in cancer care, and it’s mostly focused detecting cancer at the earliest possible stage. That makes a lot of sense, given that cancer is less deadly the earlier it’s detected.
But fewer are asking another fundamental question: if someone does have cancer, is an aggressive treatment like chemotherapy necessary? That’s the problem Ataraxis AI is trying to solve.
The New York-based startup is focused on using AI to accurately predict not only if a patient has cancer, but also what their cancer outcome looks like in 5 to 10 years. If there’s only a small chance of the cancer coming back, chemo can be avoided altogether – saving a lot of money, while avoiding the treatment’s notorious side effects.
Ataraxis AI now plans to launch their first commercial test, for breast cancer, to U.S. oncologists in the coming months, its co-founder Jan Witowski tells TechCrunch. To bolster the launch and expand into other types of cancer, the startup has raised a $20.4 million Series A, it told TechCrunch exclusively.
The round was led by AIX Ventures with participation from Thiel Bio, Founders Fund, Floating Point, Bertelsmann, and existing investors Giant Ventures and Obvious Ventures. Ataraxis emerged from stealth last year with a $4 million seed round.
Ataraxis was co-founded by Witowski and Krzysztof Geras, an assistant professor at NYU’s medical school who focuses on AI.
Ataraxis’ tech is powered by an AI model that extracts information from high-resolution images of cancer cells. The model is trained on hundreds of millions of real images from thousands of patients, Witowski said. A recent study showed Ataraxis’ tech was 30% more accurate than the current standard of care for breast cancer, per Ataraxis.
Long term, Ataraxis has big ambitions. It wants its tests to impact at least half of new cancer cases by 2030. It also views itself as a frontier AI company that builds its own models, touting Meta’s chief AI scientist Yann LeCun as an AI advisor.
“I think at Ataraxis we are trying to build what is essentially an AI frontier lab, but for healthcare applications,” Witowski said. “Because so many of those problems require a very novel technology.”
The AI boom has led to a rush of fundraises for cancer care startups. Valar Labs raised $22 million to help patients figure out their treatment plan in May 2024, for example. There’s also a bevvy of AI-powered drug discovery firms in the cancer space, like Manas AI which raised $24.6 million in January 2025 and was co-founded by Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn co-founder.
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