Google's new Pixel 2 gets reviewed. It's The Daily Crunch.

THE DAILY CRUNCH TUESDAY, OCTOBER 17 2017 By Darrell Etherington Google's latest smartphones have arrived and been torn apart by reviewers looking for any flaw in the pretty fantastic devices. Plus, Microsoft made a new Surface Book tablet/notebook hybrid, and GM wants to bring Cruise's self-driving cars to New York. All that and more in The Daily Crunch for October 17, 2017. 1. [Google's Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, reviewed]( Google's new smartphones are here, and they're worthy successors to last year's debut Pixel models, by all accounts. The improved designs seem to really help, as do general hardware updates. The [cameras might be the strongest thing about the new phones](, though: They put a lot of portable photo and video power in the palm of your hand, including cinematic quality stabilized video capture. 2. [Microsoft's Surface Book 2 arrives]( Hey! It's not just the Pixel that's new: Microsoft also dropped surprise new hardware, via the Surface Book 2. The convertible laptop/tablet now comes in two sizes, and has a crazy amount of power, including Nvidia notebook GPUs. Sponsored By: CompTIA [Join CompTIA AITP, where IT Pros Connect and Grow Join your peers at CompTIA AITP. Be part of the 21st century’s IT workforce association. Our career portal, TechTalent powered by CompTIA, will help you land your dream job, review salary benchmarks and access 1,200 skills courses from Lynda.com.]( [Learn More…]( 3. [Cruise will bring its self-driving cars to NYC streets]( GM's Cruise is bringing self-driving cars to New York, with the aim of getting more urban testing done in one of the most urban areas around. That'll make GM the first company to test autonomous vehicles on NYC streets. 4. [Apple answers Sen. Franken's questions on Face ID privacy]( Everyone's favorite privacy-minded U.S. Senator had questions for Apple about its new Face ID tech, which is used to unlock the forthcoming iPhone X. And Apple had answers, provided answers that offered some satisfaction to the Senator. Apple really doesn't care about people's private data – at least not currently. 5. [Google Maps added then removed calorie burn estimates for walking directions]( Google quietly added an experimental iOS feature that would show estimates of how many calories people would burn by walking when they called up directions. And then removed it when it was greeted by a lot of negative reaction. Google probably had no idea they'd meet with this reaction, which is part of the problem. 6. [That Uber-SoftBank deal is probably going through this week]( Uber is set to get a sizeable (as in multi billion dollar) investment from SoftBank, and that should finalize with in the next week, per Uber board member Arianna Huffington. This could lead to more dealmaking and consolidation among ride sharing providers globally, too. 7. [Snap and NBCUniversal launch a joint venture]( NBCUniversal and Snapchat parent company Snap are forming a new joint venture, designed to create original scripted short form content, for use on Snapchat. Sounds great, potentially. [Get more stories at techcrunch.com ]( Newest Jobs From CrunchBoard: - [Front End Agile Web/Mobile Developer (React/Angular, JavaScript, CSS) at IHS Markit (Boulder, CO, United States)]( - [VP/ Head of Engineering at Guardhat (Southfield, MI, United States)]( - [Integrated Library Systems Engineer at UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA (Charlottesville, VA, United States)]( - [Backend Engineer- Java at AppZen (Santa Clara, CA, United States)]( - [Frontend Engineer at AppZen (Santa Clara, CA, United States)]( [SEE MORE JOBS ON CRUNCHBOARD]( [Post your tech jobs]( and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $200 per month [Facebook](  [Twitter](  [Youtube](  [Instagram](  [Flipboard]( [View this email online in your browser]( If you do not want to receive this email or you would like to update your preferences [click here](. 410 Townsend Street, San Francisco, CA 94107 © 2017 AOL Inc. All rights reserved.   [Privacy Policy](   [Terms of Service](