Welcome to the TechBrew Ride Home for Wednesday, February 18th, 2026.

I'm Brian McCullough today.

New pixel phone, a bunch of new AI models, including Gemini's entry into the music AI space.

Everybody is trying to make AI fetch happen in India.

And Matthew Ball's State of the Gaming Industry Report

doesn't paint as gloomy a picture, as our own headlines might have suggested this year.

Here's what you miss today in the world of tech.

Google this morning unveiled the $499 pixel 10A, offering the same TensorFlow G4 chip as the 9A,

8 gigabytes of RAM, and an 11% brighter display in 128 gigabyte and 256 gigabyte offerings

shipping March 4th, quoting the verge.

Google's mid-range pixels have been our top pick for budget Android phones for a while.

They offer good cameras and most of what you need at a budget-friendly price.

But this year's upgrade feels so minimal, I'd liken it more to a Pixel 9A plus or a Pixel 9B.

The $49 pixel 10 is supposed to be a slightly worse pixel 10, but it's more like a slightly better

pixel 10A. And that's a bit of a bummer. Very few of the features that make the pixel 10 series

compelling trickled down to the 10A this year. You don't get all the good stuff that makes

the pixel 10 series more compelling. There's still last year's Tensor G4 chip and 8 gigabytes of RAM, which

isn't enough to power the more advanced AI features Google launched on the Pixel 10, like

Magic Q or Pixel screenshots, the latter of which debuted on the Pixel 9. Do you care? Maybe not.

I like Magic Q, though. And my guess is that skyrocketing RAM prices play a role here.

It could explain the lack of additional AI features, but I can't blame RAM prices for what

otherwise feels like a more meh update. So what do you get for the Pixel 10A? You also get the

...