News: Technology News

Intel could use TSMC exclusively to build Arrow Lake processor family

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 17:14:05 +0000

The Intel 18A process node is expected to bring refinements to RibbonFET, delivering a major jump in transistor performance. RibbonFET is Intel Foundry's implementation of a Gate-All-Around (GAA) transistor that improves density and performance compared to FinFET. Following a Reuters report suggesting that Intel's next major process node was not meeting customer expectations, Intel provided an update on Intel 18A.

Since releasing the Intel 18A Process Design Kit (PDK) 1.0 in July, Intel says it has received positive responses from its ecosystem. The company confirmed that Intel 18A is "powered on, booting on operating systems, and yielding well." It claims that the current defect density of Intel 18A process is already at D0

Due to the positive progress of Intel 18A, Intel has decided to shift engineering resources from Intel 20A earlier than expected. As a result, Intel's latest Arrow Lake processor family could be built primarily using TSMC and packaged by Intel Foundry.

Ben Sell, Vice President of Technology Development at Intel Corporation, said:

“The journey to Intel 18A has been built on the groundwork laid by Intel 20A. It enabled us to explore and refine new techniques, materials, and transistor architectures crucial for advancing Moore's Law. With Intel 20A, we successfully integrated both RibbonFET gate-all-around transistor architecture and PowerVia backside power delivery for the first time, and these learnings have directly informed the first commercial implementation of both technologies in Intel 18A.”

When launched next year, Intel 18A will feature an optimized ribbon stack to deliver better performance per watt and minimum supply voltage (Vmin). Additionally, the PowerVia backside power delivery architecture will improve standard cell utilization by 5-10% and ISO-power performance by up to 4%. Intel 18A is targeted towards server, HPC, and mobile applications..

While the shift in resources may affect Arrow Lake, the focus on 18A highlights Intel's determination to reclaim its leadership position in the industry.

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DJI Neo is a tiny and simple-to-use drone with 4K 60 FPS video recording

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 17:12:16 +0000

DJI, the company known for making awesome drones, has just announced a new model at the ongoing IFA 2024 event. The brand-new DJI Neo is smaller and lighter, making the already compact DJI Mavic Mini look large by comparison.

Don't be fooled by DJI Neo's small form factor. The best part is that you don't have to be a drone expert to fly it. That is because the Neo is the company's easiest-to-use drone ever.

To fly the drone, all you need to do is hit the "Mode" button on the drone and choose from the variety of shots that you wish the drone to capture, including Dronie, Circle, Rocket, Spotlight, Helix, and Boomerang. The DJI Neo drone can be controlled using the DJI Fly app on a smartphone.

Thanks to its small form factor, the DJI Neo supports palm takeoff and landing (it only weighs 135 grams). While the drone doesn't come with a controller, you can purchase a physical controller from DJI if you wish to have manual control.

The DJI Neo is equipped with a 12MP 1/2-inch sensor, allowing you to capture 40 minutes of 4K footage at 60fps and 55 minutes of 1080p video at 60fps. It comes with 22GB of onboard storage. However, do note that you won't get 40 minutes of footage in one go, as the DJI Neo's flight time is only 18 minutes.

The drone features AI subject-tracking and can also be controlled using voice commands with the wake word "Hey Fly." Additionally, you can record audio through your smartphone's mic just by tapping the audio record button in the DJI Fly app. For improved audio quality, you can connect the DJI Mic 2 via Bluetooth.

The DJI Neo costs $199 for the drone alone, while the DJI Neo Combo, which includes two extra batteries and a multi-charger, is available for $289.

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Undead Labs will end State of Decay 2 updates soon as it ramps up work on State of Decay 3

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 07:19:58 +0000

State of Decay 2, the zombie-based survival game from developer Undead Labs and publisher Microsoft, will soon reach the end of its content updates, over four years since the game was released in May 2018.

In a post on the official State of Decay website, Undead Labs says that Update 38 will be the last content update for State of Decay 2. It added:

This final update, Update 38, aims to fix some longstanding issues, implement additional quality of life improvements, and permanently unlock seasonal or otherwise previously-gated content, such as Winter outfits and the Wizard Van.

The update will be released sometime before the end of 2024. Undead Labs could release one or more hotfix patches after Update 38, but after that, the developer will no longer update the game at all. While the game will remain playable on all of its platforms after the updates end, Undead Labs will no longer accept any more bug reports after the final patches are released.

Of course, Undead Labs is now developing the next game in the series, State of Decay 3, which was first announced in June 2020. The blog post added:

While you’ve enjoyed State of Decay 2 for many years, you may have heard that we are also hard at work on the next evolution of the franchise! Our ambition is to make the greatest zombie survival sim in the franchise, and to do so, we’ll be shifting our focus and resources to making the upcoming third installment, State of Decay 3.

Undead Labs reveals a bit more info on State of Decay 3 in June 2024 as part of Microsoft's Xbox Game Showcase. It also revealed it is getting support from several other development teams, including Obsidian Entertainment, The Coalition, Blind Squirrel Entertainment, and Wushu Studios. However we still don't have a release timeframe for the game.

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Bill Gates has a good feeling about AI

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 07:19:19 +0000

The Verge spoke with Bill Gates about AI, misinformation, and climate change.

Bill Gates has spent billions funding technologies he thinks will shape the future — from fighting climate change to eradicating disease.

Gates gets into the thick of it all in a new Netflix series called “What’s Next? The Future with Bill Gates.” It launches on September 18th with episodes on AI, climate change, inequality, misinformation, and global health.

The Verge spoke with Gates to discuss what makes him so optimistic about the technologies covered in the series. And we couldn’t resist asking him about his days leading Microsoft, too.

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

In the first episode, you ask ChatGPT to recommend an exercise you can do in your office. Do you use ChatGPT in your day-to-day life, and if so, how?

Well, actually, not for exercise, although that was a good example where it gave quite a good answer.

“The amount of investment by Microsoft and others in the field, it’s hard to overstate.”

You know, I’m often learning about topics, and ChatGPT is an excellent way to get explanations for specific questions. I’m often writing things, and it’s a huge help in writing. I’d say the feature I use the most is the meeting summary, which is integrated into [Microsoft] Teams, which I use a lot. The ability to interact and not just get the summary, but ask questions about the meeting, is pretty fantastic.

Do you think Microsoft should expand its partnership with OpenAI or invest more in its own tech?

I’m an adviser to Microsoft. It’s strengthening the OpenAI relationship, doing a lot of its own. I mean, the amount of investment by Microsoft and others in the field, it’s hard to overstate.

And this comes up in this series — what about all the prophecies of doom? Are you worried about AI destroying the world?

Well, the near-term issues are more using it in a positive way, in areas like health and education. Even in the United States, we have shortages. The idea of the personal tutor, which I’ve been out in Newark to see Khanmigo [Khan Academy’s AI tool], which is based on ChatGPT. Seeing how great that is to help the teachers do their jobs, help the students who are behind or ahead stay engaged. So, for the next decade, we’ll be experiencing increased productivity in a lot of areas, which is overwhelmingly very good news.

As it gets more powerful, and you know, as bad guys are using it, there’ll be issues. But overall, I believe that it’s a beneficial thing, and we need to just shape it in the right way.

Disinformation, that’s something that researchers are also concerned about AI supercharging. Have you given any thought into how you would feel if generative AI tools that Microsoft has worked on have a significant impact on disinformation, on things like climate change and global health?

I think AI, on balance, is super beneficial to work on climate. People can type misinformation into a word processor. They don’t need AI, you know, to type out crazy things. And so I’m not sure that, other than creating deepfakes, AI really changes the balance there. In fact, I’d say that as people talk about reducing misinformation, the role of AI can be a positive role in terms of looking at what’s going on in a superefficient way.

Most of the problems in the series — like how we should think about AI, how we can get rid of malaria and improve global health, and various climate innovations — there’s things that I’m working on that are a big part of solving the problem. Misinformation is the one where I do think the younger generation is going to have to look at the tradeoffs between free speech and misinforming people.

Training AI uses a lot of energy. How do you square that with your ambitions on combating climate change, especially as Microsoft’s greenhouse gas emissions grow?

Microsoft and the other tech companies are very committed to finding clean energy sources, and so they’ll be pioneering customers, even for things like geothermal or fission or fusion, to help bootstrap that green energy generation. The actual increase from the AI data centers, even in the extreme view, would be well under 10 percent.

So, the net benefit we’re getting from AI helping us in our scientific discovery of, okay, how do you make steel? How do you make meat? What’s the weather going to be like? The AI benefits exceed the fact that that’s just another electricity load, but not a load nearly as big as electric cars or electric heat pumps or switching the industrial economy to use electricity instead of direct use of hydrocarbons.

Screenshot: Rhodium Group

You’ve funded technologies that some activists call “false solutions” to climate change because capturing carbon doesn’t get rid of fossil fuels or the other pollution they cause. And nuclear energy is kicking up a fight over uranium mining near Indigenous communities. How do you address those concerns with climate tech?

I’m a big believer that nuclear energy can help us solve the climate problem, which is very, very important. There are designs that, in terms of their safety or fuel use or how they handle waste, I think, minimize those problems.

This can become — although it’s not today — very inexpensive electricity, either using fission or fusion. So, we need to make sure we’re tasteful in how we do mining, how we store the waste. But we need those technologies.

You’re going to need non-weather-dependent sources that can be near to where the electricity loads are to complement an extreme build-out of renewables.

Fission, we can make it cheap. TerraPower is a company trying to show we can make a much safer, but much cheaper form of fission. [Editor’s note: Gates is founder and chairman of the Board of TerraPower.] And people are appropriately skeptical because it’s never been done. But they’ll get to see as we build that plant, and if so, it can make a contribution.

Carbon dioxide removal encompasses a suite of strategies to take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. These technologies could potentially help slow climate change by trapping some of the pollution fossil fuels have already released over the years. There are still concerns about its costs, safety, and potential to delay a transition from fossil fuels to carbon pollution-free energy. Experts say carbon removal is no substitute for preventing greenhouse gas emissions in the first place.

What about concerns about carbon capture? Fossil fuels create not just carbon dioxide emissions, but other pollution. How do you address those environmental justice concerns as well?

Well, coal, definitely, it’s great that in many countries, it’s been out-competed by natural gas. Because in terms of local pollution, natural gas burns very clean. And although it creates CO2 per unit of energy, it creates less. Over time, we’ll even have to get rid of natural gas, but it does not have those local pollution things. [Editor’s note: burning natural gas creates nitrogen dioxide, a smog-forming pollutant and respiratory irritant.]

Here in the US, people are not building new coal plants — they’re switching, and so the health benefits of getting rid of that local particulate are another reason to accelerate those transitions. That’s true all over the world, although they’re not as blessed with cheap natural gas as we are, which is why things like fission and fusion will play an important complementary role to renewables in large parts of the world.

I know a lot of advocates are also concerned about natural gas when it comes to methane leaks from gas infrastructure, and even leaks from gas appliances in the home, and what that means for indoor air quality.

Fusion is exciting. Experts that I’ve talked to who are also hopeful don’t think we’ll see it within the timelines needed in the Paris agreement. What makes you so optimistic about fusion being ready in time?

I’m invested in five fusion companies, which, although their timeframes are further out, I think the role of fusion over time will be very, very critical.

Given the challenge of scaling out both the existing and new technologies, we’ll certainly miss the 1.5 degree goal, and we’ll probably miss the two degree goal. And so we’ll have to be very innovative about adaptation as well, making sure that the health and nutrition and well-being of people, even in the poor countries near the equator, that we’re not letting that get worse.

Despite the fact we’ll have climate challenges over time, I don’t think we’ll have a climate disaster because we will be able to deploy these new technologies. But you know, we’re not going to avoid two degrees of warming, and so we’ll have to mix in some adaptation.

Is there anything you wish you’d done differently when you were running Microsoft?

Well, I learned all the time when I was running Microsoft. And on balance, I feel great about the company and the work that was done. I feel very lucky that my successors carried on the work so it’s still a great company today. A lot of the learning I do about AI to help in areas like global health and education comes from that engaging with Microsoft and talking to the top people there. So, you know, I really value the fact Satya gives me that opportunity.

There’s a lot of focus on antitrust right now, including breaking up tech giants. What would the tech landscape look like today if Microsoft had actually been split up in the early 2000s?

These antitrust suits, I don’t know what will come of them. When you get companies this successful, they ought to assume it’s going to happen. And of course, they can see what Microsoft did well, didn’t do well in their own journey through those challenges.

It’s hard to speculate on those things. I mean, whichever part of the company I went with would have thrived, I think.

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Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 is serious heavy-metal shooting and slashing

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 07:16:48 +0000

Strong first impressions of a game filled with enemy hordes and dark metal lore.

If you had given me, at age 15 or so, a game in which you can fight seemingly hundreds of Tyranid bugs at once with two friends, alternately blasting them with bolt rifles or pulverizing them with a chainsword, then finishing the biggest of them by ripping off one of his claws and shoving it through his head, all of it happening to the sounds of action-movie orchestration and dialogue about stoic duty, would I have had any complaints?

No, I would not. But we're spoiled for choice now. How much you enjoy Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 (for PC, Xbox, and PlayStation and releasing on September 9) will depend on your ability to tap into the deep basement of your kill-'em-all mentality and fantasy lore engagement. You can enjoy it somewhat ironically, which I did at times, especially when playing co-op with friends who told me that they did not like the game's aesthetics at all. But strip away the grimdark trappings of zealotry, Chaos Marines, and skulls—so, so many skulls—and you have a competent, sometimes innovative third-person squad shooter. It feels like Gears of War, minus the cover, but with heavier characters, more melee combat, and somehow even fewer women.

Getting the most out of Space Marine 2 means suspending disbelief, feeling heavy metal, and wanting to kill a whole bunch of things with some very big dudes. In roughly a dozen hours of gameplay, I found the core gameplay loop relatively engaging, with enough mix-ups, upgrades, and challenges to keep it feeling more like the fun kind of endless war, not the real kind. It's pretty enjoyable to team up with friends, too, so long as they're cool with Warhammer 40K's vibes and some occasionally repetitive challenges.

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 gameplay overview.

Constant lore, varied battles

I do not have deep Warhammer 40K lore knowledge (Boltgun was previously my deepest engagement), so please forgive everything I get wrong in sketching out the game's story. You, Demetrian Titus, are an Adeptus Astartes, a Space Marine, a bio-engineered huge guy with like three hearts and plugs in your head and an all-encompassing devotion to the Imperium of Man. In the prior Space Marine game, you did so well resisting the lure of Chaos that you were turned into the Inquisition and made to serve on the Deathwatch. Now you're back and demoted, and something bad happens to you in the training mission. You are saved by the Ultramarines, and you undergo the Rubicon Primaris surgery to make you an even bigger and stronger fundamentalist killing machine.

My favorite thing in Space Marine 2 is the size and fluidity of the enemy swarms. It's a real achievement in

"always outnumbered, never outgunned."

Focus Entertainment
Enemies come at you from above and below, with a mixture of range and bite-your-neck tactics.

Focus Entertainment
Dudes rocking.

Focus Entertainment
Sometimes you get jetpacks, which enable both cool slam attacks and the worst thing in shooting games:

platform puzzles.

Focus Entertainment
Is the idea that humanity becomes a culture driven entirely by superstitious faith and war (A) hilarious (B) intriguing (C) tiring or (D) all or none of the above?

Focus Entertainment

And then you're off, joined by Brother-Sergeant Gadriel and Brother Chairon, played by either your online friends or the game AI. You have a heavy primary weapon, a pistol-like sidearm, and a melee weapon, usually a chainsword, a big knife, or a huge hammer. Your armor is tough but gets worn down, and only time or pulling off a Doom 2016-style melee finisher on downed enemies will recharge it. You're not exactly agile, but you can lunge at remarkable speed, like Chris Farley in his SNL prime. And you call your teammates "brother" a lot.

What struck me most about Space Marine 2 is the mass of enemies the engine can throw at you. Described as "Swarm Tech" by the developers, it's the action movie moment where you first see what looks like a river of enemies (the Tyranid) flowing over a wall, then it's a wave of baddies at the middle distance, and then they're on top of you. The teammates with the most effective long-range weapons pick off as many as they can, then everybody scrambles to balance up-close melee with quick-aim shooting. They're not the most clever cannon fodder, but they're far more agile than you are, and they force you to change up your approach every other moment. If you like power fantasies and hard-won battles, this game delivers them.

There's a considerable mix-up in the combat arenas, weapon move-sets, and encounter designs, but not so much that fatigue won't set in. You'll see most of the melee finishers after a couple of hours, and if you get tired of the deadly jungle aesthetic of Kadaku, there is unfortunately a lot of it to trudge through. The same goes for the steel-and-skulls Imperium aesthetic and the stream of world-building dialogue ("Our greatest honor is in death to our righteous cause," etc.). I'm aware that Warhammer 40K's world predates and informs a lot of the fantasy and gaming culture that followed it (it is generally considered the origin of the phrase "grimdark"). That doesn't mean it can't be a lot to take in heavy doses. But if it doesn't bother you, there's a lot of fun killing to be had.

Good tech choices

Admirably, this game allows for cross-play across PC and consoles (and allows for not cross-playing if you like), and while it uses Easy Anti-Cheat, it has no Denuvo or other kinds of heavy DRM. There are preorder special editions and DLC, but they are cosmetic-only, adding skins and looks to armor and weapons.

There's a day-one patch coming to fix a bunch of multiplayer bugs; I would always suggest waiting a bit before rendering the technical verdict on a game this big. On a system with a Ryzen 9 5900X, RTX 3070 GPU and 16GB memory (and solid-state storage, a requirement for this game), I encountered no major problems. One friend with the same GPU and a similar system did not update their GPU drivers and was briefly paralyzed by frame rate issues. Update your drivers, folks. Load times can be a little long, especially for a game that would otherwise be great for quick "just one mission" sessions; hopefully those improve with time.

If you're keen on Warhammer 40K and online squad shooting with friends or need an alternative Gears fix between releases, Space Marine 2 is a lot of fun, however seriously you take it. The developer's attention to detail and affection for the over-the-top vibes shine through, like polished pauldrons caked in Tyranid gore.

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Asus will launch a NUC mini-PC with a Microsoft Copilot button

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 07:12:46 +0000

You may remember that Asus announced over a year ago the company got non-exclusive rights to keep making NUC mini-PCs after Intel decided it was bailing out of that business. Since then Asus has been releasing new NUC mini-PCs, including one made specifically for gamers.

Today, as part of its IFA 2024 announcements, Asus revealed a lineup of new Copilot+ PC-based laptops that will use Intel's recently revealed Core Ultra Series 2 (200v) processors. However, it also revealed something else; a new NUC mini-PC that also has an Intel Core Ultra Series 2 chip.

It's called the Asus NUC 14 Pro AI, and it's one of the rare PCs that use Microsoft's Copilot+ PC platform that is not a notebook. Once more, the case of this PC has a Microsoft Copilot button, which we do not recall seeing on any desktop-based PC before now.

While it does make some sort of sense to have a Copilot button on a keyboard for use on a Copilot+ PC notebook to launch the generative AI assistant, we do kind of wonder why the Copilot button is on this mini-PC. Unless the case is placed on a desk near to a user while it's hooked up to a keyboard and monitor, that Copilot button will likely be pressed very rarely.

Besides the Intel Core Ultra Series 2 chip and the Copilot button, the NUC 14 Pro AI will also have Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 wireless hardware, two USB-A ports and a USB-C port in the front, where the Copilot button is located. In the back there will be two more USB-A ports, an HDMI port, and Ethernet port, and a Thunderbolt 4 port.

We don't have any info yet on the amount of RAM or storage this PC will have. We also don't have a release date or pricing for the Asus NUC 14 Pro AI. We do know that all Copilot+ PC devices with Intel's Core Ultra Series 2 chips will get the big Copilot+ PC Windows 11 update from Microsoft in November.

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Australian government trial finds AI is much worse than humans at summarizing

Thu, 05 Sep 2024 07:11:05 +0000

Llama2-70B failed to capture "complex context," but updated models might do better.

As large language models have continued to rise in prominence, many users and companies have focused on their useful ability to quickly summarize lengthy documents for easier human consumption. When Australia's Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) looked into this potential use case, though, it found that the summaries it was able to get from the Llama2-70B model were judged as significantly worse than those provided by humans.

ASIC's proof-of-concept study (PDF)—which was run in January and February, written up in March, and published in response to a Senate inquiry in May—has a number of limitations that make it hard to generalize about the summarizing capabilities of state-of-the-art LLMs in the present day. Still, the government study shows many of the potential pitfalls large organizations should consider before simply inserting LLM outputs into existing workflows.

Keeping score

For its study, ASIC teamed up with Amazon Web Services to evaluate LLMs' ability to summarize "a sample of public submissions made to an external Parliamentary Joint Committee inquiry, looking into audit and consultancy firms." For ASIC's purposes, a good summary of one of these submissions would highlight any mention of ASIC, any recommendations for avoiding conflicts of interest, and any calls for more regulation, all with references to page numbers and "brief context" for explanation.

In addition to Llama2-70B, the ASIC team also considered the smaller Mistral-7B and MistralLite models in the early phases of the study. The comparison "supported the industry view that larger models tend to produce better results," the authors write. But, as some social media users have pointed out, Llama2-70B has itself now been surpassed by larger models like ChatGPT-4o, Claude 3.5 Sonnet, and Llama3.1-405B, which score better on many generalized quality evaluations.

More than just choosing the biggest model, though, ASIC said it found that "adequate prompt engineering, carefully crafting the questions and tasks presented to the model, is crucial for optimal results." ASIC and AWS also went to the trouble of adjusting behind-the-scenes model settings such as temperature, indexing, and top-k sampling. (Top-k sampling is a technique that involves selecting the most likely next words or tokens based on their probabilities predicted by the model.)

ASIC used five "business representatives" to evaluate the LLM's summaries of five submitted documents against summaries prepared by a subject matter expert (the evaluators were not aware of the source of each summary). The AI summaries were judged significantly weaker across all five metrics used by the evaluators, including coherency/consistency, length, and focus on ASIC references. Across the five documents, the AI summaries scored an average total of seven points (on ASIC's five-category, 15-point scale), compared to 12.2 points for the human summaries.

Missing the nuance

By far the biggest weakness of the AI summaries was "a limited ability to analyze and summarize complex content requiring a deep understanding of context, subtle nuances, or implicit meaning," ASIC writes. One evaluator highlighted this problem by calling out an AI summary for being "wordy and pointless—just repeating what was in the submission."

"What we found was that in general terms... the summaries were quite generic, and the nuance about how ASIC had been referenced wasn't coming through in the AI-generated summary in the way that it was when an ASIC employee was doing the summary work," Graham Jefferson, ASIC’s digital and transformation lead, told an Australian Senate committee regarding the results.

The evaluators also called out the AI summaries for including incorrect information, missing relevant information, or highlighting irrelevant information. The presence of AI hallucinations also meant that "the model generated text that was grammatically correct, but on occasion factually inaccurate."

Added together, these problems mean that "assessors generally agreed that the AI outputs could potentially create more work if used (in current state), due to the need to fact check outputs, or because the original source material actually presented information better."

Just a concept

These results might seem like a pretty conclusive point against using LLMs for summarizing, but ASIC warns that this proof-of-concept study had some significant limitations. The researchers point out that they only had one week to optimize their model, for instance, and suspect that "investing more time in this [optimization] phase may yield better and more accurate results."

The focus on the (now-outdated) Llama2-70B also means that "the results do not necessarily reflect how other models may perform" the authors warn. Larger models with bigger context windows and better embedding strategies may have more success, the authors write, because "finding references in larger documents is a notoriously hard task for LLMs."

Despite the results, ASIC says it still believes "there are opportunities for Gen AI as the technology continues to advance... Technology is advancing in this area and it is likely that future models will improve performance and accuracy of results."

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Qualcomm’s new 8-core Snapdragon chip is aimed at cheaper Arm Windows PCs

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 16:46:20 +0000

Windows-on-Arm has gotten better, but we're still waiting for good budget PCs.

Windows-on-Arm is finally just about good enough to serve as your main PC, thanks to a combination of long-awaited Snapdragon X-series silicon from Qualcomm, Arm-specific improvements in the Windows 11 24H2 update, and third-party software developers that are slowly but surely putting out Arm-native versions of their most popular apps.

So far, those Snapdragon X chips have been confined mostly to $1,000-and-up premium PCs like the Surface Pro and Surface Laptop. But Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon has said that he wants to get better hardware into midrange laptops in the $700 range, and today the company took a concrete step toward making that happen: a new version of the Snapdragon X with 8 CPU cores instead of 10, but the same Oryon CPU architecture (a neural processing unit [NPU] that still meets Microsoft's requirements for Copilot+ PCs) and the same Snapdragon X Plus branding as the faster 10-core versions.

There are two separate versions of the 8-core Snapdragon X Plus. The X1P-46-100 version allows its CPU to boost up to 4.0 GHz for single-core tasks and has a GPU capable of 2.1 TFLOPS of performance (compared to 3.8 for the 10-core X plus, and 4.6 for the fastest Snapdragon X Elite variants). The X1P-42-100 version only boosts up to 3.4 GHz in single-core mode and has a 1.7 TFLOPS GPU. All of Qualcomm's NPUs are the same, offering 45 trillion operations per second (TOPS).

The full list of 10- and 8-core Snapdragon X Plus chips.

Qualcomm

The 8-core version of the Snapdragon X Plus hasn't exactly been a secret; benchmarks of the slower X1P-42-100 variant have already leaked, suggesting that its CPU performance mostly holds up—5 percent slower than the 10-core X Plus in single-core tests, 20 percent slower in multi-core tests, but as much as 50 percent slower in games and GPU benchmarks. None of the Snapdragon X chips are capable of high-end gaming, but it looks like these low-end X Plus chips will be poorly suited to anything other than basic 3D rendering.

As for the NPU performance and the Copilot+ label, Microsoft says these PCs will be capable of running more generative AI and machine learning tasks locally, rather than using cloud services. There aren't many Copilot+ features available yet, but there are reasons to like the Copilot+ label even if you hate generative AI and intend to turn off every AI feature you can find a toggle for: Copilot+ PCs also need to have at least 16GB of RAM and 256GB of solid-state storage, making them that much better for web browsing and general-purpose computing.

It's worth noting that this 8-core X Plus looks like yet another cut-down version of the flagship Snapdragon X Elite silicon; we have yet to see anything from Qualcomm that has been purpose-built to serve the low-end PC market. Historically, Qualcomm has used two separate silicon tiers for its Windows PCs—the high-end Snapdragon 8cx series and the low-end Snapdragon 7c series—and we haven't seen what an Oryon-based successor to the 7c might look like.

Qualcomm probably doesn't want to offer cheap alternatives to its flagships too early—why risk cannibalizing sales of higher-end PCs? But if Qualcomm actually intends to ship the volume of Arm PCs it claims it wants to (Amon has said he thinks getting Qualcomm SoCs in 60 percent of all PC shipments is a realistic possibility), it will need to ship more products that serve the low-cost, high-volume PC market. This new 8-core Snapdragon X Plus is a decent fit for a middle-of-the-road PC, but it seems unlikely to hit $500-and-under laptops any time soon.

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No Man's Sky Aquarius update lets you go fishing on alien planets

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 16:44:57 +0000

After years of free updates, Hello Games has yet another one ready for fans of No Man's Sky. Dubbed the Aquarius update, it is letting players fish in the watery planets that they encounter. The studio is calling this a sound addition to the Worlds Part 1 update from July, which overhauled planetary effects, including the water, by a large degree.

The latest update is largely focused on improving water gameplay, and fishing is a major part of it, which the developer is calling a "uniquely relaxing experience". Space explorers can land on any planet with a waterbody and try to catch the variety of aquatic life that the studio has implemented into the sci-fi sandbox. If a fish doesn't bite, what comes out could even be a special message in a bottle.

If fishing from the shores is too boring, Hello Games is also introducing a deployable Exo-Skiff to float across the seas, rivers, and oceans to fish in deeper waters. The studio expects players to explore a range of different environments and water conditions while crafting specialist bait. This is how rare and legendary fish can be caught.

If sitting next to water on random planets gets a little old, Hello Games is also introducing automated fishing traps in this update. Once researched, players can set up autonomous floating fish farms and return later when their bounties are full for easy fishing.

Other features of Aquarius include fresh cooking recipes that complement fishing, a record that keeps track of all catches and their information, a deep-sea diving suit to explore the depths, and plenty of ocean-themed cosmetic additions for decorating spaceships and bases.

Alongside all the fishing-related content, a brand-new six-week-long Expedition is live now too:

Go on a quest across the galaxy to catch fish, gather stories, and think about the one that got away… Players who complete the Aquarius expedition will earn a beautifully detailed set of deep-sea customisation parts, including a unique underwater jetpack.

No Man's Sky Aquarius update is now available across PC (Steam and Xbox app), Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Game Pass, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and Nintendo Switch systems. Find the full patch notes here.

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Intel’s advanced chipmaking process reportedly runs into trouble

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 16:43:38 +0000

Tests of Intel’s 18A process didn’t go as planned, according to Reuters.

Intel’s chipmaking business may have run into a bit of a snag, as recent tests using the company’s next-gen manufacturing process have failed, according to Reuters.

To carry out the tests, Intel reportedly sent Broadcom’s silicon wafers — or the components used as a semiconductor’s base — through its more efficient 18A manufacturing process. After examining the results, Broadcom found that the process isn’t ready for high-volume production, Reuters reports.

The 18A process is a key part of Intel’s plan to reestablish itself as a leading chipmaker. Intel has been developing this technology for a few years now, and it plans to start producing chips using the process with major partners like Microsoft starting next year. However, the company has had a troubled past few months, as it reported $1.6 billion in losses in the second quarter of 2024 and announced layoffs affecting more than 15,000 workers. It’s also dealing with widespread issues affecting its 13th and 14th Gen CPUs.

“Intel 18A is powered on, healthy and yielding well, and we remain fully on track to begin high volume manufacturing next year,” an Intel spokesperson told Reuters. “There is a great deal of interest in Intel 18A across the industry but, as a matter of policy, we do not comment on specific customer conversations.” The Verge reached out to Intel with a request for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.

Over the weekend, Reuters reported that Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger will soon pitch his plans to overhaul the company’s spending and cut down on unnecessary assets. The company is reportedly considering selling off Altera, an Intel-owned business that creates programmable logic devices, and may pause work on its chipmaking factory in Germany. Intel has already delayed the $20 billion plant it has planned in Ohio.

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Starlink complies with court order and blocks X in Brazil

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 16:41:44 +0000

Earlier this week, Elon Musk and his internet satellite company Starlink told Brazil's telecom agency that they wouldn't block access to X.com in Brazil following a ban on the website by a judge. Now, Starlink posted on X that it is going to comply with the ban order, but will fight against the decision which it has branded illegal.

The X post was also reposted by Starlink CEO Elon Musk, who, this time, didn't have anything to add. The company's post reads:

"To our customers in Brazil (who may not be able to read this as a result of X being blocked by Alexandre de Moraes) :

The Starlink team is doing everything possible to keep you connected.

Following last week’s order from Alexandre de Moraes that froze Starlink’s finances and prevents Starlink from conducting financial transactions in Brazil, we immediately initiated legal proceedings in the Brazilian Supreme Court explaining the gross illegality of this order and asking the Court to unfreeze our assets. Regardless of the illegal treatment of Starlink in freezing of our assets, we are complying with the order to block access to X in Brazil.

We continue to pursue all legal avenues, as are others who agree that Alexandre de Moraes recent orders violate the Brazilian constitution."

The trouble started for Elon Musk and X when he decided that supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro should have their accounts reinstated. Bolsonaro lost the 2022 presidential election but contested the result and his supporters ultimately stormed several state buildings.

The unblocking of these accounts led to an investigation into X by Alexandre de Moraes. He decided recently that internet providers in the country should block access to the social network and that X's accounts should be frozen to pay for fines owed by the company.

It's this last part that provoked Musk to initially resist the block with Starlink continuing to offer access to the website. It's not clear what provoked the change of heart to block X, it could have been legal advice that the company received.

Brazil's telecom regulator, Anatel, told Reuters that Starlink has already begun to restrict access to X in Brazil, showing it's complying with the ban.

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Nvidia's RTX 5090 rumored to consume 600W and RTX 5080 400W of power

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 02:50:29 +0000

New purported details have emerged about the power requirements of Nvidia's GeForce RTX 50 series. If one rather well-known hardware leaker, Kopite7kimi, is to be believed, then the power consumption of NVIDIA's Blackwell lineup could go through the roof compared to the current RTX 40 series.

The flagship RTX 5090 is rumored to consume a 600 watts of power, a full 150-watt increase over the RTX 4090. To provide such power, the 5090 is said to be fitted with one 16-pin power connector. Further down the stack, the RTX 5080 reportedly requires a 400-watt draw, 80 watts over the RTX 4080, and also carries a single 16-pin input.

Interestingly, Kopite7kimi claims the RTX 5080 should see around a 10-15% overall performance boost compared to the RTX 4090. However, it's still unclear if this refers to rasterization, ray tracing, or a combination of metrics.

Meanwhile, the power consumption figures for the remaining members of the RTX 50 series have also surfaced. The RTX 5070 is expected to run at a 220 watts, while the RTX 5060 is supposedly rated at 170 watts-55 watts more than the RTX 4060. The entry-level RTX 5050 is said to have a 100 watts.

Leaker did not specify whether the power figures quoted here are for TGP or TDP. and can vary depending on the various SKUs, not to mention manual adjustments. In other words, quoted wattages can be altered by using whatever designs the different board partners develop.

In addition to soaring power demands, next-generation models may also come packed with the unprecedented amount of VRAM. Earlier, the leaker did suggest that the RTX 5090 and 5090 Ti could come with a whopping 32GB of VRAM.

The RTX 50 series is rumored to be unveiled by the end of this year, although several reports do suggest the actual launch may slip into 2025.

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Intel announces Intel Core Ultra 200V CPUs; laptops with the chips launch September 26

Tue, 03 Sep 2024 17:30:38 +0000

As promised a few weeks ago, Intel announced its next-generation Core Ultra CPUs, designed for use in Windows laptops, at a pre-IFA event in Berlin today. The Intel Core Ultra 200V series processors use the Lunar Lake architecture.

In a press release, Intel says that the Core Ultra 200V series will deliver up to 120 total platform TOPS across its CPU, GPU, and NPU chips while also using up to 50 percent less power than the previous generation Core Ultra chips. It stated:

The new processors deliver efficient and exceptional core performance through fine-tuned power management, completely rearchitected Performance-cores (P-core) optimized for performance per power per area. And Intel’s most powerful Efficient-cores (E-cores) to date are now able to contain more workloads, ensuring cool and quiet performance.

Intel says that the new NPU chip is more than four times more powerful than the previous generation NPU in the last Core Ultra. The GPU in the new Core Ultra 200V uses Intel's Xe2 graphics microarchitecture, with up to a 30 percent performance upgrade compared to the previous version. Laptops with the new chip will have battery life that lasts up to 20 hours on a single charge.

Intel says most of the laptops sold with the new Core Ultra 200V chip will be branded as Intel Evo Edition laptops. Any notebook with that brand will have to include the following features:

Long real-world battery life.

Built-in security that helps prevent malware attacks and minimizes vulnerabilities.

Built-in Intel Arc graphics for accelerated creation and smoother game play, even while on the go.

Lightning-fast connectivity with Intel® Wi-Fi 7 (5 Gig).

Ability to connect PC to multiple monitors, transfer files and charge PC with Thunderbolt Share3.

Instant wake and fast charging.

The highest sustainability standards with EPEAT Gold certification.

Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, LG, MSI and Samsung are all planning to launch laptops with the Intel Core Ultra 200V chips, and they will officially launch on September 24, with pre-orders available starting today

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Intel-powered Windows 11 computers are getting Copilot+ PC AI features this November

Tue, 03 Sep 2024 17:28:54 +0000

Today, Intel unveiled its newest mobile chips, the Core Ultra 200V series (codenamed Lunar Lake), which is packed with the company's latest innovations and powerful neural processing units (NPUs). Intel also confirmed Microsoft's earlier statement that computers with Intel's Lunar Lake and AMD's Strix Point processors will qualify for the new Copilot+ PC category.

As of right now, all Copilot+ PCs are powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Series processors. Built-in neural processing units enable additional AI-powered experiences, such as Recall, Windows Studio Effects, image generator in Paint and Photos, the new AutoSR upscaler, Live Captions, and more. Also, optimized applications can use neural processing units to accelerate various tasks.

If you are not ready to jump to Windows on ARM but would like to try Copilot+ PC capabilities, thanks to Intel's and AMD's new chips, you will soon be able to do so without potential compatibility compromises.

Intel says the new AI features will be available as a part of a free update somewhere in November, perhaps implying at the launch of Windows 11 version 24H2:

All designs featuring Intel Core Ultra 200V series processors and running the latest version of Windows are eligible to receive Copilot+ PC features as a free update starting in November.

Microsoft has yet to make it clear how computers with AMD and Intel processors will get new Copilot+ PC capabilities. Sadly, those features are not coming to existing computers with x86 processors from Intel and AMD.

The first computers with Intel's new Core Ultra 200V processors will launch on September 24, and they are now available for preorder. Besides new Windows 11's AI features, devices powered by the 200V processor family boast Wi-Fi 7 connectivity, long "real-world battery life," faster graphics, lower temps, and quieter operation. You can learn more about those processors here.

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All about neural processing units (NPUs)

Tue, 03 Sep 2024 09:00:00 +0000

The neural processing unit (NPU) of a device has architecture that simulates a human brain’s neural

The neural processing unit (NPU) of a device has architecture that simulates a human brain’s neural network. Learn how it pairs with AI and provides you with powerful advantages in this new era.

It processes large amounts of data in parallel, performing trillions of operations per second.
It uses less power and is far more efficient at AI tasks than a CPU or GPU.
It excels at AI tasks and frees your CPU and GPU up for other tasks. Combining an NPU with machine learning gives you a powerful combo.
It provides lightning-fast, high-bandwidth AI in real time—a great advantage for using voice commands, creating images quickly, and more.
It helps you work fast and be more creative.

For more information, see Copilot+ PCs.

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Pavel Durov's problems mount as South Korea is investigating Telegram too

Mon, 02 Sep 2024 21:13:38 +0000

The CEO of messaging app Telegram, Pavel Durov, is currently in France, where he was arrested and charged for crimes committed by third parties using his app. As of today, his problems have just got worse because South Korean police have said that they're now launching a preliminary investigation on suspicions that the platform abetted deepfake sex crimes.

For the record, deepfake sex crimes refer to videos and pictures of real people with their faces digitally edited onto nude bodies. Even though it's a fake, it can be very damaging to someone's reputation if just one person thinks it's real and starts gossiping.

Woo Jong-soo, head of the National Office of Investigation, said:

"As France has done, the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency launched an internal investigation into the corporate entity of Telegram before officially booking it. The charges are about abetting this crime [(deepfakes)]. Telegram does not readily provide investigation data, such as account information, to us or other state investigative bodies, including those in the U.S."

South Korea's police will not be investigating the tech firm alone. Yonhap News reports that the police will collaborate with the French investigative authorities and other international institutions to find methods of investigating Telegram.

It seems as though the news of Durov's arrest has spurred people in South Korea to report crimes. The police there say that 88 deepfake sex crime reports were filed between last Monday and Thursday and that 24 individuals have been identified as the suspects behind the material. It's investigating eight automated programs for creating deepfakes, and it's looking into several groups that have been sharing the deepfakes.

It seems as though Durov's major mistake was running a laissez-faire messaging platform with not much content moderation. It's unclear right now how things will play out, but it's very doubtful that Telegram will continue operating the way it has been. The most likely outcomes are that Telegram gets ordered to moderate content, it gets sold to a new owner who will moderate content, or it simply ceases operations.

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Bluesky gains a million new users from Brazil after X ban

Mon, 02 Sep 2024 07:12:09 +0000

Bluesky reports that it has gained a million new users towards the end of August and in early September following a ban on Elon Musk's X in Brazil. Bluesky is one of the popular alternatives that sprung up in reaction to Elon Musk acquiring Twitter.

wow... welcome to the ONE MILLION new users in the last three days!!! 🎉 uau... bem-vindos ao UM MILHÃO de novos usuários nos últimos três dias!!! 🎉

— Bluesky (@bsky.app) 2024-08-31T21:21:33.341Z

On August 31, it was reported by Neowin that Brazil's Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes has ordered X to be banned in the country. The ban included an "immediate, complete, and total suspension of X's operations" in the country. It was initially the case too that Apple and Google would need to remove X from their Brazilian app stores but this measure was removed to prevent disruption to "third-party companies".

Trouble started for X when Elon Musk decided to reactivate the accounts of supporters of former president, Jair Bolsonaro. Similar to Donald Trump, Bolsonaro is described as right to far-right or as a populist. His supporters also stormed government buildings after he lost the last election and they called for a coup to install him, unsuccessfully.

In response to the reactivation of the accounts, Justice Alexandre de Moraes opened an investigation into X which culminated in its ban from the country. X cannot be used by citizens or businesses in the country and there is a fine of 50,000 Brazilian Real (around $8,900) for anyone who attempts to circumvent the block.

Bluesky is in many ways very similar to Twitter from a few years ago, even the blue and white color scheme is the same and its logo is also a winged animal - a butterfly, rather than a bird. It launched as an invite-only service at first but became available to everybody in February this year.

According to an unofficial stats page Bluesky has 7.79 million users in total. This figure is dwarfed by another Twitter alternative, Meta's Threads, which now boasts 175 million users.

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Microsoft Weekly: new Windows updates, game reviews, much-needed Start menu fixes, and more

Sun, 01 Sep 2024 21:04:22 +0000

In this episode of Microsoft Weekly, we look at a bunch of new Windows updates, including preview builds, some interesting upcoming features and Start menu tweaks, game reviews, browser updates, useful Windows utilities, and more.

Table of contents:

Windows 10 and 11 news
Windows Insider Program
Updates are available
Reviews are in
Gaming news
Gaming deals and freebies
Tech deals

Windows 11 and 10

Here we talk about everything happening around Microsoft's latest operating system in the Stable channel and preview builds: new features, removed features, controversies, bugs, interesting findings, and more. And of course, you may find a word or two about older but still supported versions.

Windows 10 and 11 received their latest non-security updates this week. Customers with Windows 11 versions 22H2 and 23H2 can download KB5041587. The update delivers File Explorer improvements and a significant performance boost on AMD's recent Ryzen processors (there is no need to wait for version 24H2). For Windows 11 version 24H2 on Copilot+ PCs, Microsoft released KB5041865.

By the way, more affordable Copilot+ PCs are coming soon. A new leak revealed that Qualcomm and its partners are getting ready to launch new computers with an eight-core Snapdragon X Plus. Prices of those computers should start at just $800, which is 20% less than current Copilot+ PCs, such as the Surface Pro 11.

Speaking of Copilot+ PCs and their exclusive capabilities, Recall, a controversial feature that is returning in October this year, will be uninstallable. Users noticed that the latest non-security update for Copilot+ PCs now allows uninstalling Recall as an optional feature.

This week, we learned some information about another Microsoft-related processor, the Maia 100. This AI accelerator was unveiled during Ignite 2023, and now, we have official specs, which include size, packaging, cache, TDP, and more. Just do not expect to see the Maia 100 in a consumer-grade computer—this monster of a CPU is for large-scale AI workloads in Azure.

To finish the Windows 10 and 11 section, here is a neat third-party mod that can help improve the tray area in Windows 11 by always displaying all available icons. For some reason, Microsoft still has not brought the "Show all apps" from Windows 10, so third-party developers decided to fix the company's OS themselves.

Windows Insider Program

Here is what Microsoft Released this week for testing in the Windows Insider Program:

	Windows 11	Windows 10
Canary Channel	27695	Not Applicable
Dev Channel	-	Not Applicable
Beta Channel	22635.4082 22635.4145	-
Release Preview Channel	-	-

Users discovered that one of the recent Windows 11 preview builds from the Beta Channel contains more improvements to the Start menu's upcoming Category view. Its categories are now tied to the Microsoft Store, and each app has a tooltip.

Another change in this week's Beta build is an improved "Account manager," which no longer hides the "Sign out" button behind a submenu. With the latest update, the button prominently sits at the top-right corner, allowing you to sign out without opening any additional submenus. However, the list of other profiles on your computer is still hidden behind a three-dot button.

Finally, there is an interesting AI-powered feature that may soon let you search in local audio and video files. Build 27695 contains references to the so-called "Intelligent media search" with the following description:

Search by spoken words in your indexed video or audio files. By clicking 'I agree,' you consent to scanning the media files on your device. If needed, the required model will be downloaded and installed in the background. Your media files are being processed Once the AI model is set up, it needs to transcribe your media files and index them before enabling content-based search. We'll inform you once the process is complete.

Microsoft has yet to announce the feature and explain what hardware is required to run it.

Updates are available

This section covers software, firmware, and other notable updates (released and coming soon) delivering new features, security fixes, improvements, patches, and more from Microsoft and third parties.

Microsoft released two big updates for Windows Terminal, the default command-line application on Windows 10 and 11. Version 1.21 is out in the Stable Channel, and 1.22 is out as a preview. The latter now supports Sixels, features a new console hosting infrastructure, and more. Microsoft said Windows Terminal 1.21 and 1.22 are the biggest releases to date.

Microsoft Edge also received quite a lot of updates this week. Version 129 is now available in the Beta Channel with a few important changes. For once, it bumps the minimum OS version for Mac users and now requires macOS 11 and newer. Users with older releases are now unsupported. Also, Edge 129 deprecates the built-in Crypto Wallet (why it was there in the first place is an open question).

In the Dev Channel, Edge received an update with new features for Edge Bar and various bug fixes across different platforms. And in Canary, Microsoft is testing a revamped appearance section.

For Microsoft 365 Insiders, Microsoft is testing new automatic document summarization in Word. Open a document, and Copilot will automatically generate a summary without you needing to take any action. However, the feature requires a Copilot Pro subscription. In Excel, insiders can try a new TRIMRANGE function. As for the controversial Outlook app, it is getting new accessibility features.

Also, Microsoft announced that Copilot for Microsoft 365 will get new language support—look out for 12 new languages sometime this month. Finally, new features are coming to Teams, including channel cards, Town Hall improvements, and more.

Microsoft Edge was not the only browser that received big updates this week. Vivaldi shipped version 6.9 with additional customization options, such as the ability to rename tabs. There are also notable UI performance improvements, multiple fixes for the built-in mail client, and more. More importantly, Vivaldi is now fully native on Windows on ARM devices, such as Copilot+ PCs.

Windows Super God Mode, a third-party script that makes it easier to access all Windows settings in one place, received its first update. Version 1.1 introduced better link detection for non-Appx apps, fixed some bugs, and brought some other tweaks to make the script run better. You may find it better than the standard Console panel, which is not going anywhere.

By the way, Windows Super God Mode is now integrated into xd-AntiSpy, another third-party app that makes Windows 11 slightly less annoying. Version 4.12.5 is now available with a built-in plugin marketplace, a new settings page, and more.

Oofhours Media Tool (OMT) is another neat utility you may want to keep on your computer, especially if you like tinkering with non-conventional Windows editions. OMT's latest version can now write downloaded ISO files directly to USB media, a feature that was missing in the initial release.

Other notable updates include the following:

Finally, check out the Microsoft 365 Roadmap Weekly series, where we track new features coming soon to Microsoft's productivity apps, such as Outlook, Excel, Planner, Teams, and more.

Reviews are in

Here are the hardware and software we reviewed this week.

Steven Parker reviewed the LincStation N1, a compact SSD-only NAS with four slots for M2 NVMe SSDs and two slots for 2.5-inch SATA SSDs. The N1 boasts silent operation, a relatively low price, great energy efficiency, Wi-Fi 6 support, and a Type-C on the front panel. However, you will have to settle with just six drives and one Ethernet port.

This week turned out to be NAS-focused, with Steven publishing another all-SSD NAS review. The K100 All-SSD NAS is a solid and tiny storage with an Intel N100 processor, DDR5 memory, great build quality and design, small footprint, decent connectivity, and some minor flaws, such as PCIe 3.0 lanes, the inability to expand RAM, and more.

Pulasthi Ariyasinghe reviewed Age of Mythology: Retold, a new entry in the Age franchise. The game is remarkably good, with an amazing environment and unit visuals, an original soundtrack, reworked animations, a new villager priority system, and the ability to retain the spirit of the original. The only con is that there are some complaints about performance.

Robbie Khan also published a game review highlighting the pros and cons of the just-launched Star Wars Outlaws. Sadly, the cons outnumbered the pros, with the game suffering from repetitive gameplay, steep hardware requirements, boring missions, and more.

On the gaming side

Learn about upcoming game releases, Xbox rumors, new hardware, software updates, freebies, deals, discounts and more.

Activision launched the open beta of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, and if you want to join, make sure your computer is up to spec to run the game. Earlier this week, Activision revealed what hardware your PC should have to deliver a satisfactory experience in the upcoming first-person shooter. By the way, check out a new Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 trailer here.

Turn 10 Studios published a lengthy blog post highlighting upcoming changes in Forza Motorsport. Look out for improvements to Spectate Mode, drift, creative hub, new raceways, fresh cars, and more. In addition, the studio launched a dedicated Forza Insider program, which will let users play preview builds and share feedback directly with developers.

If you are looking for a high-end gaming controller that won't make you suffer due to stick drift, check out the new Razer Wolverine V3 Pro. It features Hall effect sticks, customizable buttons, premium materials, and more. Just be ready for a hefty price tag, as the controller is not cheap.

Speaking of controllers, the latest August 2024 update for supported Xbox consoles features improvements for the Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 and the Xbox Adaptive Controller. These gamepads now support toggle hold. Other changes in the update include improved Discord integration and more.

Deals and freebies

Have some spare cash that is burning your pockets? Feel free to check out our Weekend PC Game Deals article, where, as usual, we gathered a hefty list of discounted games. There are also some nice freebies, such as a bundle of classic Fallout games from the Epic Games Store.

Other interesting stories from this week include the following:

Great deals to check

Every week, we publish multiple deals on Amazon and Newegg. Some of them are still live, so check out the list below, perhaphs, you will find something interesting for you with a solid discount.

Here are this week's deals that are still available:

Accessories:

Garmin Forerunner 265 fitness-focused smartwatch - $349 | 22% off
Amazon Basics Rectangular Power Strip Tower Surge Protector - $19.38 | 20% off
Ultimate Ears Book 4 Bluetooth Speaker - $119.99 | 20% off
1TB Samsung PRO Plus microSD card - $99 | 17% off

PC and gaming hardware:

Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 - $142.33 | 21% off
AMD Ryzen 7 5800X - $171 | 62% off
AMD Ryzen 9 9900X - $449 | 10% off
Toshiba X300 12TB and 8TB Performance and Gaming HDDs - 16% and 11% off
Seagate IronWolf 12TB NAS HDD - $199 | 17% off
Samsung T7, T7 Shield, and T5 EVO SSDs
MSI Claw handheld console
Lenovo IdeaPad 3i Chromebook - $219 | 24% off

TVs and monitors:

23.8-inch Acer Nitro Full HD monitor - $99 | 33% off
27-inch Samsung ViewFinity S9 5K IPS - $800 | 50% off
29.5-inch Acer Nitro curved monitor - $199.99 | 29% off

Other devices and deals:

Amazfit Helio Smart Ring - $199 | 33% off
Amazon Fire HD 10 - $99 | 44% off
Amazon Fire TV devices
Amazon Prime for Young Adults costs $0 for the first 6-months

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7600X3D’s Big Catch, RIP Anandtech, NVIDIA Yield Issues - Tech News Sept 1 [Video]

Sun, 01 Sep 2024 21:00:41 +0000

Paul's Hardware (1.48M subscribers)

September 1, 2024

Video length: 13m 0s

0:00 Welcome to Paul’s Tech News - Sept 1, 2024

1:40 Ryzen 5 7600X3D confirmed, but is Micro Center exclusive

4:33 Anandtech Shuts Down

6:31 NVIDIA Confirms Yield Issues with Blackwell AI GPUs

7:58 Intel Weighs Options Including Foundry Split to Stem Losses

TECH BRIEFS

9:10 EK is STILL in Hot Water

10:18 DeepCool penalizes Chinese distributor who sold sanctioned products on Amazon US

11:14 Sony Shooter Concord Debuts to a Tragic 697 Concurrent Players on Steam

11:55 Cooler Master painted a landscape onto a CPU using thermal paste ► LINKS Ryzen 5 7600X3D confirmed, but is Micro Center exclusive

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Realistic-looking fake Ryzen 7800X3D that don't even have CPUs inside are selling

Sun, 01 Sep 2024 20:46:34 +0000

While the used market can often offer a lot of savings compared to the new, it also usually brings with it several risks. For example, the product may not be as good as it is advertised, or there is some underlying issue the seller does not disclose. Consumer technology goods, like processors, are no exception. In the latest report of fake CPUs, a new counterfeit AMD Ryzen 7800X3D processor has surfaced that does not even have a processor inside it.

The incident has been reported by YouTuber and chip overclocking guru der8auer who was informed about it by one of his subscribers from Romania. The buyer purchased the part on OLX, an online marketplace website that is popular in certain parts of the world.

When they installed the chip in their PC, they noticed that the system did not attempt to boot up. Suspecting that it was a bad CPU, they tried to get readings from it with a multimeter, only to find that there was nothing at all. The supposed 7800X3D processor they had bought was not sending anything when probed.

der8auer bought the chip from the duped buyer to investigate what was really going on under the hood. While counterfeit processors and GPUs are often faked by using lower SKUs that impersonate higher-end parts, the forged 7800X3D, in this case, did not have any CPU die inside at all, explaining the lack of any readings on the multimeter. It was only populated by capacitors, while both the I/O die and the CCD (core complex die) were missing.

Forged I/O die and CCD are actually part of the IHS itself

The real I/O die and CCD are missing

der8auer discovered this when he opened up the processor's IHS (integrated heat spreader) and delidded the chip using a Thermal Grizzly Delid-Die-Mate to see what was inside.

He also felt that this was one of the finest examples of faking something, as it was done quite professionally. der8auer also noted some giveaways that can help identify such a processor. For example, the color of the paint did not quite match the real thing, and the Z-height was also different. However, noticing these things from afar is going to be very difficult.

Source and images: der8auer EN (YouTube)

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How keep your laptop’s battery in good health

Sat, 31 Aug 2024 18:59:34 +0000

Take care of the battery on your Mac or Windows PC, and it will take care of you.

The rechargeable lithium-ion batteries that power most of our laptops may be the most practical battery tech we have right now, but they naturally degrade over time as their ions flow back and forth — it’s an inevitable consequence of the way they’re built and the way they work. Eventually, the batteries can’t hold as much of a charge.

Most modern laptops now come with some kind of smart charging technology built in, to limit the number of full charges that happen. How this is implemented varies between laptops — I’ll talk about this, as well as other ways to ensure the battery on your MacBook or Windows laptop stays as healthy as possible for as long as possible.

General battery health

As with smartphones, because of the chemical reactions happening inside your laptop’s battery, fully charging it or fully discharging it puts more stress on the battery and shortens its life. According to Microsoft, keeping a laptop plugged in at a 100 percent charge isn’t recommended when it comes to long-term battery health, so it suggests that users try and avoid full charges and full discharges as much as possible.

Then there’s temperature: Heat and cold aren’t good for battery health. They affect the chemical reactions inside the battery and increase internal wear and tear, so make sure your laptop is kept out of boiling hot cars or off of freezing cold balconies as much as possible — and if you do let your laptop get too hot or cold, slowly bring it down to a more normal temperature. (This also goes for extended periods of intense use — if your device starts getting too hot, take a break.)

You also need to consider temperature and charging if you’re going to be stowing your laptop away for a while. Make sure it’s kept in a cool and moisture-free space, and charge the battery up to 50 percent before shutting down the laptop, which limits the chances of damage from a full discharge.

Even simple steps like keeping case fans clean and clear can help: the better the air circulation inside your laptop, the cooler the components will run and the less power they’ll draw.

You might also want to reduce the brightness of the screen, too, and make sure all of your software is up to date — newer versions of programs and operating systems are typically more efficient and less demanding.

Battery health advice for Macs

Modern MacBooks come with an Optimized Battery Charging feature.

Screenshot: Apple

Apple MacBooks use a built-in feature called Optimized Battery Charging, which will only charge the battery past 80 percent when it thinks it’s needed. According to Apple, temperatures and previous charging patterns are used to help make this decision.

Macs equipped with Apple Silicon (as opposed to an Intel processor) have Optimized Battery Charging turned on by default. If, for any reason, you want to turn it off:

From the Apple menu, select System Settings…,
On the Battery tab, click the small “i” next to Battery Health.
You’ll see the Optimized Battery Charging on / off toggle.

If you have a Mac with an Intel processor, the feature may still be on by default, depending on your OS. If you want to check that or turn it on / off:

From the Apple menu, select System Preferences > Battery
Go to Battery > Battery Health
Look for Manage battery longevity and turn it on or off.

You can reduce battery strain further in the Battery tab: click Options to set the screen to dim and to stream video at a lower quality (reducing system strain) when you’re on battery power, for example.

There’s also a special Low Power Mode, though Apple doesn’t say much about it, except that it reduces energy usage. Select the Low Power Mode drop-down menu, and you can set it to be on all the time, just when you’re relying on battery power, or just when you’re using a power adapter.

Apple’s Battery page offers a Low Power Mode and indicators of how your battery’s health is doing.

Screenshot: Apple

To reduce energy use even further:

Select the Lock Screen tab in System Settings.
Select when to turn off the display of an inactive laptop by using the Turn display off on battery when inactive drop-down menu.

Something else to think about is reducing the number of apps you’ve got running at any one time: the less power you use running apps you don’t need, the less often you’ll have to charge the battery. Cutting down on the number of programs launching with macOS can help here.

Battery health advice for Windows

Windows offers a feature called Smart charging as an equivalent to the Mac’s Optimized Battery Charging feature, though it’s up to individual laptop manufacturers as to whether or not it’s implemented and how exactly it works. You’ll have to check with your particular systems manufacturer if your laptop has it and if you can turn it on or off.

While some features might vary, depending on the manufacturer, there are several ways to optimize battery

use on the “Power & battery” page.

Screenshot: Microsoft

There are other power management settings on your computer that can conserve energy use:

Launch Settings from the Start menu.
Select System > Power & battery.
Click Screen and sleep to set how long the system waits before turning off the screen.
Choose Power mode to tell Windows whether to prioritize performance or battery life.
Click Battery saver to have Windows’ low power mode turn on at a certain battery level, or to keep it on indefinitely.
Battery usage can let you know how well your battery is functioning, and how much power your apps are using.
You may also have a section called Energy recommendations at the top of the Power & battery page; it doesn’t hurt to click on that and check out some of those recommendations.

As on macOS, making sure you’re running only the apps you need to be running will further ease the strain on the battery — it’s a good idea to double-check the programs starting up with Windows to make sure there’s nothing running in the background that you’re not aware of.

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Gearbox unveiled the first concept art for Borderlands 4

Sat, 31 Aug 2024 08:26:49 +0000

Borderlands 4 made its first appearance at PAX West, where Gearbox Studios has unveiled new concept art and details about the next installment in the popular franchise. All in all, four pieces of concept art were revealed that let one get an idea of different and unique locations players will have to explore in the new game.

One screenshot stood out from the rest by depicting a more industrial and dated area compared to the usual futuristic vibes of Borderlands. Art director Adam May said this location highlights how the Borderlands universe is a post-apocalyptic yet future world, allowing for high tech and lo-fi elements to coexist. The varied environments shown signal that players can expect more diverse and unique worlds to adventure through.

The Borderlands universe is super interesting and there is so much to get to play with. It is a post-apocalyptic world but in the distant future, so it’s like high-tech but lo-fi. It creates all kinds of interesting opportunities with what we can do with tech, our weapons, our characters, and world in general.

May also teased that some plot details will connect to the ending of Borderlands 3. A brief teaser trailer placed seconds before the conclusion of the previous game hints this may be an alternate timeline or continuation of events. Few solid plot points were divulged, but returning characters are possible.

May called Borderlands 4 "the most diverse and beautiful game we've ever made." While still early in development, the emphasis on creativity with technology signals big advancements for the series.

Previously, Gearbox Software kicked off the first Borderlands 4 trailer during the Gamescom Opening Night Live Stream. While the next installment does not have a confirmed release date, Gearbox confirmed Borderlands 4 is set to hit PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S in 2025.

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AnandTech, mainstay of computer hardware reviews, closes after 27 years

Fri, 30 Aug 2024 20:49:10 +0000

Site was founded by a 14-year-old Anand Lal Shimpi in 1997.

Few '90s tech sites other than Ars Technica are still operating here in 2024, and today, there's one fewer. AnandTech, a staple of CPU and GPU news and reviews since 1997, will stop publishing today, according to an announcement from Editor-in-Chief Ryan Smith.

"For better or worse, we’ve reached the end of a long journey—one that started with a review of an AMD processor, and has ended with the review of an AMD processor," wrote Smith, referring to reviews of AMD's K6 and Ryzen 9000-series chips, respectively. "It’s fittingly poetic, but it is also a testament to the fact that we’ve spent the last 27 years doing what we love, covering the chips that are the lifeblood of the computing industry."

The site's current owner, Future PLC, will keep the AnandTech archives online "indefinitely" and will continue to manage the site's forums, Smith wrote. Several AnandTech staffers will continue to publish articles at Tom’s Hardware, another '90s vintage technology site that continues to publish today (AnandTech and Tom’s have both been owned by the same company since 2014, though they retained separate sites and branding).

Media headwinds

Smith wasn't specific about exactly why the site was closing, but he implied that the shutdown was a financial decision on Future's part.

"[T]he market for written tech journalism is not what it once was—nor will it ever be again," wrote Smith. "There is still more that I had wanted AnandTech to do, but after 21,500 articles, this was a good start."

Ars Technica founder and Editor-in-Chief Ken Fisher, familiar with the challenges of keeping a late-'90s technology website relevant and profitable, largely agreed with Smith's assessment.

"The market for tech journalism has changed," Fisher said. "Technology is now thoroughly mainstream when compared to the late '90s. Big Tech advertisers are just as happy now to market their products or services on lifestyle websites as they once did primarily on tech sites. Furthermore, whatever the cause (mostly 'growth at all costs' thinking), Google no longer sends the traffic it once did. This is especially true for tech buying advice (reviews, explainers, etc.), which AnandTech excelled at providing. Reader culture has changed, too. In-depth explainers and long-form reviews are costly to produce but result in ever-dwindling audiences. Google AI Overviews then 'helpfully' summarizes your content, and you get even less in return."

Perhaps not coincidentally, much of the audience for in-depth PC component reviews has migrated to Google's YouTube, where big channels like Linus Tech Tips and Gamers Nexus traffic in meticulous component reviews that owe a clear debt to AnandTech's rigorous methodology and endless seas of bar charts.

AnandTech's closure comes just a few days after Gannett announced that it was shutting down Reviewed, another technology-focused site founded in 1997. Camera review site DPReview, founded in 1998, was nearly closed down last year, but it was saved at the 11th hour when Amazon was able to sell the site to Gear Patrol.

In the spirit of full disclosure: AnandTech wasn't my first paid writing gig, but it was certainly the first one of any note and the first where I did any serious review work on hardware (like the very first touchscreen Kindle) and software (like the Windows 8 Consumer Preview).

Site founder Anand Lal Shimpi began AnandTech as a 14-year-old "armed with very little actual knowledge" (in his own words), and by December 1999, it had become noteworthy and authoritative enough that CNN Money described it as a "megahot computer-review site." Shimpi's family remained involved in the site for years after its founding—when I was freelancing there in 2011 and 2012, the person I sent my invoices to was Anand's mother.

Although best known for its PC component reviews, the site also did in-depth reporting on Arm processors during the early smartphone era, and AnandTech was one of the few outlets publishing in-depth firsthand technical information about early Apple Silicon processors like the Apple A4, A5, A6, and the 64-bit A7. When Shimpi left AnandTech in 2014, it was to start a new position at Apple.

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More affordable Copilot+ PCs are coming next month

Fri, 30 Aug 2024 20:48:09 +0000

Microsoft, Qualcomm, and other partners launched the first Copilot+ PCs with Snapdragon X processors in June. Although there are already plenty of solid discounts on first models, those computers remain $1,000+ devices, which puts them out of reach for many customers (the Surface Pro 11 starts at $999). The good news is that more affordable models are coming as soon as September 2024.

Evan Blass, one of the most reliable sources of leaks, published a slide from Qualcomm that highlights features of the upcoming Copilot+ PCs with a more affordable Snapdragon SKU. The company recently added a new eight-core Snapdragon X Plus SKU to its lineup of ARM processors for Windows, and the upcoming IFA 2024 in Berlin will introduce sub-$1,000 ARM laptops. Therefore, look out for new Copilot+ PCs in different form factors with price tags of down to $800.

Besides having notably fewer cores than more expensive models, buyers who want more affordable Copilot+ PCs will have to compromise graphics performance and CPU clocks. However, they will get the same 45 TOPS NPU for AI tasks, the same solid energy efficiency, support for up to three external displays at 4K 60 Hz, and all the features of Copilot+ PCs, such as Windows Studio Effects, Paint Cocreator, Windows Recall (this one is coming in October for Windows Insiders), and more.

Source: @evleaks on X

It will be interesting to see what other compromises manufacturers will make to bring down the cost of their Copilot+ PCs.

Do you plan to purchase a Copilot+ PC in the near future? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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ChatGPT hits 200 million active weekly users, but how many will admit using it?

Fri, 30 Aug 2024 20:46:56 +0000

Despite corporate prohibitions on AI use, people flock to the chatbot in record numbers.

On Thursday, OpenAI said that ChatGPT has attracted over 200 million weekly active users, according to a report from Axios, doubling the AI assistant's user base since November 2023. The company also revealed that 92 percent of Fortune 500 companies are now using its products, highlighting the growing adoption of generative AI tools in the corporate world.

The rapid growth in user numbers for ChatGPT (which is not a new phenomenon for OpenAI) suggests growing interest in—and perhaps reliance on— the AI-powered tool, despite frequent skepticism from some critics of the tech industry.

"Generative AI is a product with no mass-market utility—at least on the scale of truly revolutionary movements like the original cloud computing and smartphone booms," PR consultant and vocal OpenAI critic Ed Zitron blogged in July. "And it’s one that costs an eye-watering amount to build and run."

Despite this kind of skepticism (which raises legitimate questions about OpenAI's long-term viability), OpenAI claims that people are using ChatGPT and OpenAI's services in record numbers. One reason for the apparent dissonance is that ChatGPT users might not readily admit to using it due to organizational prohibitions against generative AI.

Wharton professor Ethan Mollick, who commonly explores novel applications of generative AI on social media, tweeted Thursday about this issue. "Big issue in organizations: They have put together elaborate rules for AI use focused on negative use cases," he wrote. "As a result, employees are too scared to talk about how they use AI, or to use corporate LLMs. They just become secret cyborgs, using their own AI & not sharing knowledge"

The new prohibition era

It's difficult to get hard numbers showing the number of companies with AI prohibitions in place, but a Cisco study released in January claimed that 27 percent of organizations in their study had banned generative AI use. Last August, ZDNet reported on a BlackBerry study that said 75 percent of businesses worldwide were "implementing or considering" plans to ban ChatGPT and other AI apps.

As an example, Ars Technica's parent company Condé Nast maintains a no-AI policy related to creating public-facing content with generative AI tools.

Prohibitions aren't the only issue complicating public admission of generative AI use. Social stigmas have been developing around generative AI technology that stem from job loss anxiety, potential environmental impact, privacy issues, IP and ethical issues, security concerns, fear of a repeat of cryptocurrency-like grifts, and a general wariness of Big Tech that some claim has been steadily rising over recent years.

Whether the current stigmas around generative AI use will break down over time remains to be seen, but for now, OpenAI's management is taking a victory lap. "People are using our tools now as a part of their daily lives, making a real difference in areas like healthcare and education," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told Axios in a statement, "whether it's helping with routine tasks, solving hard problems, or unlocking creativity."

Not the only game in town

OpenAI also told Axios that usage of its AI language model APIs has doubled since the release of GPT-4o mini in July. The suggests software developers are increasingly integrating OpenAI's large language model (LLM) tech into their apps.

And OpenAI is not alone in the field. Companies like Microsoft (with Copilot, based on OpenAI's technology), Google (with Gemini), Meta (with Llama), and Anthropic (Claude) are all vying for market share, frequently updating their APIs and consumer-facing AI assistants to attract new users.

If the generative AI space is a market bubble primed to pop, as some have claimed, it is a very big and expensive one that is apparently still growing larger by the day.

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2023: Over 5,800 news posts | 2024 (till end of July): 3,313 news posts

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Updates are available

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On the gaming side

Great deals to check

7600X3D’s Big Catch, RIP Anandtech, NVIDIA Yield Issues - Tech News Sept 1 [Video]

Realistic-looking fake Ryzen 7800X3D that don't even have CPUs inside are selling

How keep your laptop’s battery in good health

Take care of the battery on your Mac or Windows PC, and it will take care of you.

General battery health

Battery health advice for Macs

Battery health advice for Windows

Gearbox unveiled the first concept art for Borderlands 4

AnandTech, mainstay of computer hardware reviews, closes after 27 years

Site was founded by a 14-year-old Anand Lal Shimpi in 1997.

Media headwinds

More affordable Copilot+ PCs are coming next month

ChatGPT hits 200 million active weekly users, but how many will admit using it?

Despite corporate prohibitions on AI use, people flock to the chatbot in record numbers.

The new prohibition era

Not the only game in town