Skip to main content

Price Check: Logitech's colorful speaker, Star Wars cookies, and interstellar gaming

Price Check: Logitech's colorful speaker, Star Wars cookies, and interstellar gaming

Share this story

If you buy something from a Verge link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement.

Welcome to Price Check, our weekly post dedicated to sorting through all the new products and deals that we find. We also get a ton of gadgets sent to our office, so consider this the best place for us to tell you about them and where you can find them — sometimes even for cheap.

Star Wars gingerbread cookies

Star Wars gingerbread cookie cutters ($9)

We're now less than a year away from Star Wars: The Force Awakens, but the wait is probably going to feel like an eternity for most fans. So what better way to bide your time than to eat your feelings after making some Star Wars gingerbread cookies with these cookie cutters? There are six different characters, though they're a bit random — no Luke, Leia, or Han. You do get Darth Vader and Boba Fett, as well as Chewbacca and C-3P0, so you can reenact some choice scenes from Empire before you chow down.

Star Wars gingerbread cookie cutters at ThinkGeek ($9)

Civilization: Beyond Earth ($29)

Polygon Sid Meier Civilization Beyond Earth

We learn more and more about space every year, but we are still so far away from being able to truly explore it in person. Luckily, the newest entry in the beloved Civilization series lets you do just that. It's full of that same great strategic gaming that Sid Meier's other titles are known for, but with an interstellar twist. We named it one of our best games of 2014, and you can grab a copy today on Steam for 40 percent off.

Civilization: Beyond Earth on Steam ($29)

Sandisk usb drive

Sandisk Ultra Dual USB Drive 32GB ($18)

File-sharing services like Dropbox, Google Drive, and even Airdrop are making it easier and easier to move files to or from your computer. That means the prices of USB drives — which were already dropping — are really starting to hit rock bottom. If you're still in need of ultra-portable physical file storage, this Sandisk USB drive is a steal. The real bonus is the microUSB port, which lets you plug right into your Android phone.

32GB Sandisk Ultra Dual USB Drive at Newegg ($18)

Ue mini boom

Logitech UE Mini Boom ($69)

The Bluetooth speaker market is booming, which means that not only are they becoming affordable but they're starting to sound really good, too. Stop putting your phone in a bowl and consider buying the UE Mini Boom instead. It wasn't our favorite portable Bluetooth speaker — that was the Mini's big brother, the UE Boom — but it's the best one you can buy for under $100. It's loud, the battery will last you for 10 hours, and it comes in some crazy colors.

UE Mini Boom at Amazon ($69)

Ankr 60W 6-port USB charger ($35)

Ankr USB

Think of how many devices you have that can be charged via USB. Now think about how many USB ports your laptop has — something's not right here. This 6-port charger is one of the most popular solutions around our office for this problem, and on the road, it's a live-saver. When we were in Maine shooting with the BMW i8, our hotel lacked outlets to an unsafe degree, but this thing kept us fully charged and ready to go.

Ankr 60W 6-port USB charger at Amazon ($35)