Our favorite speakers, headphones, and other music gear

Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 73, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, belated happy Pokémon Day, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)

This week, I’ve been reading about the Zizians and fancy suits and Heavyweight, watching Suits LA and The White Lotus, obsessively tracking Formula 1 testing, apologizing profusely to anyone who watched The Gorge on my recommendation, working to an eight-hour mix of the Severance music, seeing if Bend will actually help me stretch more, and watching a lot of Encanto with a toddler who refuses to sleep.

I also have for you a new repairable laptop, a spiffy new mobile version of Photoshop, the coolest and strangest camera I’ve seen in a while, good explainers on app development and content moderation, and much more. Plus, the second part of our two-part exploration of all your favorite music gear. I’m psyched. Let’s do it.

(As always, the best part of Installer is your ideas and tips. What do you want to know more about? What awesome tricks do you know that everyone else should? What app should everyone be using? Tell me everything: installer@theverge.com. And if you know someone else who might enjoy Installer, forward it to them and tell them to subscribe here.)

The Framework Laptop 12. All my PC gamer friends are more excited about the Framework Desktop, but I think the company’s cheapest (and best-looking) laptop is going to be one to watch. There’s still a lot we don’t know about this thing, but I hope I get to recommend it to a lot of folks this year.Photoshop for iPhone. For the first time, there’s a mobile version of Photoshop that actually feels like Photoshop. This is not entirely a good thing — there’s a lot going on in this app — and Adobe is awfully late to the game here, but a super-powered image editor is always a welcome thing on smartphones. Flashes for Bluesky. What if Bluesky, but Instagram? That’s the whole idea behind this app, which reskins Bluesky to be much more visual and image-heavy, and gives you a way to quickly post photos (with filters!) of your own. This is the kind of open social stuff I just love.Claude 3.7. I’m still hearing all the time about how much more people like Claude than ChatGPT or Gemini, and this new model is fascinating. “Deep research” is all the rage right now, but Claude now lets you decide how deep, and thus how slow, it’ll be. The Sigma BF. In terms of features and usability, there’s no way this is the best $2,000 camera you can buy. But on pure aesthetic appeal, I’m not sure anything is beating this blocky, beautiful, ultra-simplified camera. Monster Hunter Wilds. It’s only February, and this is already getting a lot of Game of the Year buzz — there are a lot of new mechanics to get used to, but it appears to be very much worth the six-year wait.Beeper Beta. I won’t lie, I kind of forgot about Beeper. But it’s back and starting to ship again; the new Mac app is basically the old Texts.com app with a new color scheme, but the iOS app appears to be totally new. (Android, meanwhile, remains the best platform for Beeper by a mile.)John Oliver on Facebook and content moderation. I always love John Oliver, but this is particularly great: thoughtful and smart on Section 230, the challenges and politics of content moderation, and much more. Also, don’t miss the Last Week Tonight guide to making yourself less valuable to Meta.“Why Are There So Many iOS-Only Apps?” An extremely good answer to an extremely Installer-y question! (And one I’ve been looking into recently, as well.) To all of you who are annoyed there aren’t more Android-first apps in here: I’m with you, and here’s why.

Last week, we talked about our favorite music apps. Turns out we all love Plexamp, tolerate Spotify, and would love to have a better way to catalog and share our own music collections. This week: gear. So many of you reached out wanting to share your favorite speakers, headphones, DACs, receivers, RCA cables, and everything else that I figured I’d try and lay out some of the most popular stuff in my inbox.

First, the big and (maybe) obvious takeaway is that y’all love Sonos gear. The vast majority of people who reached out said that the best thing you can buy for a budding music setup is a great pair of stereo speakers, and most of you started with Sonos. For all its app woes, it seems there’s still no beating Sonos’ combination of sound quality and connectivity. That said, I did also get some great alternative recommendations:

A bunch of folks recommended various Edifier speakers, across the whole range of products. They’re nice, and y’all seem to like their stuff from the cheapest Bluetooth models to the highest-end pro gear.I would never in a million years have guessed how many people would tell me they have, and love, HomePods and HomePod Minis. I heard from so many people who bought them on one sale and are thrilled with the results.I also heard a bunch about the KEF LSX, a set of really nice-looking speakers that work wirelessly or wired, with Chromecast and AirPlay, and are exactly the kind of versatile bookshelf speakers I’ve been looking for. I’m going to end up buying these.Lots of “just buy a soundbar” responses, too! The Vizio soundbar got some love, but I heard from a few people that practically any soundbar will be a huge upgrade to your living room audio system. I tend to agree.

For headphones, there surprisingly wasn’t a clear winner. But there were a few models that came up a lot: The Sony MDR-7506, the Sennheiser HD 600, the Sony WF-C510, the Beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro, the Bowers & Wilkins PX7 S2E, and the Bose QuietComfort. There are also plenty of AirPods Pro fans out there, too.

I got a lot of receiver and amp recommendations — it’s definitely the second upgrade, after a good set of speakers, that most people bring into their setup — but only one brand came up more than once. A lot of folks love their WiiM Ultras for combining digital and analog music, the WiiM Mini seems to be a must-have for folks with older stereo gear, and the WiiM Amp Pro is the centerpiece of a lot of your setups. I’ve never really used WiiM stuff, but I’m going to have to change that.

Some other notes from my inbox:

Turntables are so back. Audio Technica seems to be the go-to brand, but I also heard good things about the U-Turn Audio Orbit and all of Pro-Ject’s gear.I am convinced that every single person who owns a Sony Walkman emailed me to tell me they love it. I believe you! I kind of want one now. There are also a lot of iPod restorers out there, and one person who shared the coolest-looking CD player I’ve ever seen.There is a strong preference for streaming audio over Chromecast Audio, rather than AirPlay, Bluetooth, or anything else. The quality is better, and a bunch of you told me it’s more reliable and better synced across speakers.A few of you told me about home systems you’ve built with Raspberry Pis, the HiFiBerry converter, and the HiFiBerryOS. Sounds like a relatively straightforward and extremely fun project.

Thank you again to everyone who reached out and contributed to our group project the last few weeks — I read every email, Signal message, and social post, and I learned so much from all of you. We’ll have to do more music stuff soon, too, since I’ve really only scratched the surface here. Stay tuned!

I am, both by virtue of my job and my particular brand of strangeness, always scouring the internet for people’s tech setups. I think I’m just permanently convinced that I’m One Weird Trick away from my whole life being perfect, sane, and organized, you know?

When I came across a semi-viral Threads post showing a really clever iPhone setup that made heavy use of Shortcuts and Focus modes, I immediately needed to know more. I’ve never been able to really figure out Focus modes in particular, and I wanted to see if this was the key. So I reached out to its creator, Colin, who goes by the username Tinyblocks. I asked Colin to share their own setup to see what else I might learn. So here’s Colin’s homescreen, plus some info on the apps they use and why:

Colin’s home screen, in five parts.

The phone: I’m using an iPhone 15.

The wallpaper: The minimal wallpaper I use is designed to blend with the dock for a cleaner look. It’s created by another Notion creator, the Digital Minimalist.

The apps: Gmail, Slack, Figma, Google Drive, Google Sheets, WhatsApp, Telegram, LinkedIn, Messenger, Discord, Instagram, X, Threads, Circle, Skool, Gumroad, YouTube, Google Maps, Naver, KorailTalk, Kakao T, Booking, Airbnb, Naver Papago, Translate, HappyCow, Revolut, Salad, KH Online, Wallet, Indy, AutoEntrepreneur, Binance, Finary, Bankin’.

After seeing how many people were interested in my dock setup, I created a free detailed guide that’s available on my Gumroad.

The core of my setup uses Focus modes and Shortcuts. I’ve created custom Focus modes, each with a dedicated page containing only relevant apps. For example, my Travel mode has maps, translation apps, Airbnb, and booking apps; Finance mode has banking apps and expense trackers. Each Focus mode has customized notifications to minimize distractions.

I replaced the default dock apps with four shortcuts to my main Focus modes, allowing me to transform my phone’s setup with just one tap. For apps I use across all modes, I utilize the Today View (left swipe) with widgets and shortcuts to apps like Messages, Photos, Gmail, Notion, Claude, Arc, and SyncTask.

I also asked Colin to share a few things they’re into right now. Here’s what they shared:

Productivity tools, especially Notion (I’m working on becoming a Notion creator). Learning Korean (I’m living in Korea currently). It’s challenging but rewarding. I have a private lesson once a week. As I’m a huge Notion nerd, I’ve created my own setup there to track vocabulary and grammar rules.My nerdy side comes out with audiobooks, particularly anything by Brandon Sanderson. Right now I’m listening to his Secret Project books. My favorite series from him is the Wax & Wayne series (Mistborn Era 2).I recently started a consistent gym routine and am really enjoying it. I began with a few PT classes to get started, and now I’m following my trainer’s recommended plan for the next few weeks. I’ll probably end up making my own gym planner (in Notion, of course).

Here’s what the Installer community is into this week. I want to know what you’re into right now as well! Email installer@theverge.com or message me on Signal — @davidpierce.11 — with your recommendations for anything and everything, and we’ll feature some of our favorites here every week.

“We started using Huckleberry right away to track our baby’s eating, diapers, sleeping, and even my wife’s pumping, and we probably haven’t grazed the surface of what the app offers. Super helpful to simply make sure your baby has eaten enough and has soiled enough diapers plus much more! I also work for a sales company that uses Salesforce to log everything, and it definitely takes practice to get used to it, so this is great practice!” — Spencer

“I’ve recently paired up my Keys-To-Go 2 with my Boox Poke 3 and it’s a perfect coffee shop set-up for distractionless writing.” — Jeroen

“Starting to watch the third season of Industry, the Max series about a group of hungry, young graduates competing for a limited number of permanent positions at Pierpoint & Co., a leading bank in London.” — Rob

“I’ve been diving into the world of e-readers this week and just made the switch from Kindle to a Kobo Clara BW. It’s the perfect handheld size with clear text and an auto warm light that makes reading sessions at night so easy. It’s like a smaller Paperwhite. But what I’ve really enjoyed are the thoughtful software touches that bring elements of physical books to e-readers, like the ability to digitally ‘dog-ear’ a page by folding the corner! Such a nice touch!” — Ian

“ChessUp 2. The board allows you to play chess against the computer, and it can also provide assistance to one or both of the players during a 1v1 game. The board and pieces feel really high quality, and give a satisfying soft and pleasant sound when you move them. The lights coming from the board give the whole experience a very cool feel that reminds me of the 3D chess in Star Wars episode IV.” — Thomas

“Learning how to prove you’re not an AI, and the future of content verification with C2PA.” — Colin

“Saw the Anybox mention in the latest Installer as a way to capture links and notes, but a AAA tip for you or your readers: it’s also a fantastic way to capture images across any Apple device and categorize them for later. From cool game shots to retro print ads to memes that express any emotion, it’s been essential to my work Slack responses.” — Ryan

“Watched this documentary on NHK about the creator of the manga Detective Conan. This shows what people do for the love of the art” — Gigg

“I was able to join the alpha for Deta Surf and it’s one of the strangest and most interesting web browsers I’ve ever used. It’s absolutely brimming with personality. It feels more like a weird experiment than a browser in some ways at the moment, but I love seeing this kind of creativity in the software space.” — Luke

A few weeks ago, my social feeds started filling up with videos and clips from the comedian Josh Johnson. This was great news; he’s hilarious. And he’s also one of the most internetty and newsy comedians I’ve ever seen — he has a really fun set on DeepSeek, another one on the TikTok ban, and another one on Hawk Tuah, just to name a few. He writes for The Daily Show, so I guess it makes sense that he’s all over pop culture. But I’ve hit the point where I’ll watch anything he posts, and I sincerely can’t figure out how he’s this funny and this prolific. My favorite thing on YouTube right now, and it’s not super close.

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