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There are a slew of keyboards and apps that help people learn how to play the piano, but a small company called PopuMusic is showing off an intriguing set of products at CES to make the process easier. PartyKeys and PartyStudio are a 36-key MIDI keyboard and MIDI / Bluetooth speaker that pair together in seamless fashion. The PartyStudio is particularly interesting because it has a built-in library of 128 instrument tones and more than 50 different drum machine patterns. Naturally, it works with the PartyKeys, but any MIDI keyboard can connect to it and use those sounds.
The PartyStudio and PartyKeys both use NFC to connect to each other — you can just tap and hold the keyboard up to the speaker for pairing. You can connect up to three devices using MIDI over Bluetooth Low-Energy (BLE MIDI) as well as a fourth using a wired connection. If you have more than one keyboard, meanwhile, you can connect them together with NFC as well — you can pair three keyboards together total, giving you a huge 108-key surface to play.
Both the PartyStudio and PartyKeys have an understated but appealing look to them (they're available in black or white) and feel quite substantial and well-made. PopuMusic has been releasing hardware via Kickstarters campaigns for a few years now, so even though they're a relatively small and new company they have some experience in this department. The speaker seems to hit a nice balance of portability and power; it has two tweeters and two woofers and weighs in at 3.75 pounds. It's about 13.5 inches wide, 5.2 inches tall and 4 inches deep, so it's not a tiny speaker you'll just throw in your bag, but it still feels easy to tote around thanks to its attached handle.
The other trick that the PartyStudio and PartyKeys have is on the software side. Using a companion app, multiple people can play along with a song. The light-up keyboard can show you what to play, and if you have multiple people playing each keyboard can display compli
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If cleaning up your digital life is on your New Year's resolution list, we've got good news: 1Password is offering half off its subscription plans (both the Individual and Families plans). That brings the price of the Individual plan down to $24 for a year and the Families plan down to $36 for a year.
The plans are nearly identical, but the Families plan accommodates five additional people. These discounts are only available to new customers and the prices expire after the year, so set a reminder to cancel or reassess. And you'll need to act fast, because the offer expires today — Tuesday, December 30.
This provider topped our list of the best password managers, and for good reason. We appreciated the intuitive interface and the fact that it's available on most platforms, so you'll never be left out in the cold. These include Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge, macOS, iOS, Windows, Android and more.
Subscriptions include industry standard encryption and a "secret key" that only you know on top of a master password. There's also two-factor authentication and the platform issues alerts when credentials have potentially been compromised.
1Password recently raised prices across the board, but this is still looking to be the best deal for our favorite password manager going into the new year. The only downside here is the one that accompanies many password managers: There is no free version. Obviously, this won't be an issue for the year, but it could once the plan runs out.
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