Add a portable battery base to your Google Home for $39
That's the lowest price you'll find anywhere for this handy Home accessory. Plus: An unusually good deal on Beats wireless earphones!
CNET's Cheapskate scours the web for great deals on PCs, phones , gadgets and much more. Questions about the Cheapskate blog? Find the answers on our FAQ page. Find more great buys on the CNET Deals page and follow the Cheapskate on Facebook and Twitter!
The Loft gives your Google Home up to 8 hours of battery-powered mobility -- maybe more.
One of my favorite products of recent memory is the Ninety7 Vaux, a battery-powered speaker for the Amazon Echo Dot .
Okay, but what if your smart-speaker of choice is the Google Home ? Must it forever stay within arm's length of an electrical outlet?
Not anymore. For a limited time, you can get the Ninety7 Loft portable battery base for Google Home for $38.95 shipped when you apply promo code CNETLOFT at checkout. That's a Cheapskate exclusive, my friends; civilians have to pay full price!
The Loft comes in your choice of three colors: Copper, snow and carbon. Installation is a snap, just twist off your Google Home's decorative base, insert the Loft and you're done.
Just to clarify, this is a single-purpose product: It adds portability to your Home in the form of a rechargeable battery, one that's good for up to eight hours, according to Ninety7. It's not, like the aforementioned Vaux, a speaker as well.
The key thing to remember is that your Home still needs connectivity if you want it to function as anything other than a Bluetooth speaker. Take it outside the house, for example, and it won't respond to commands -- not unless you use your phone as a hotspot for it.
But if you just want to move your Home around your, well, home, this makes it possible. And super-easy.
As fate would have it, CNET reviewed the Ninety7 Loft just yesterday. That's good, because I haven't tried it myself. Interestingly, tests revealed a battery life of more like 10 hours, not just eight. (Your mileage may vary, of course.)
It's a mostly positive review, though can you guess one of the dings? Yep, price! And I agree $50 seems a touch steep, stylish and practical though the Loft may be. But here's your chance to get a discount of better than 20 percent! What say you?
Think you can't afford Beats? Think again.
Bonus deal: The Beats headphone brand is synonymous with premium and, if you ask me, overpriced. Ah, but do you get what you pay for? Let's come back to that.
For a limited time, and while supplies last, Daily Steals has the certified-refurbished Beats by Dr. Dre Powerbeats3 Wireless in-ear sport headphones for $74.99 shipped when you apply promo code BEATSBYRICK at checkout. That's another exclusive, folks -- best price you'll find elsewhere is at least $5 more.
Back in 2016, CNET's David Carnoy, in his review of the Powerbeats3, called these "improved but still pricey." That was based on a $200 (!) price tag. So for just $75 out the door, these are a steal, right?
Maybe. Here in 2018, yours truly got the chance to test-drive a sample of Daily Steals' Powerbeats3 inventory. Condition: Indistinguishable from new, save for the brown-box packaging.
Sound quality: I encountered the same issue as Carnoy; I couldn't get a really good seal with any of the provided eartips, a problem I don't usually have with earphones. Consequently, I wasn't able to enjoy what is widely regarded as top-notch sound quality. Your mileage may vary.
Verdict: If you've always craved the Beats brand but couldn't justify the sky-high pricing, here's your chance to get a genuinely good deal. Don't care about branding? Watch this space, because I routinely share sport 'buds that cost even less.