This week, on a more focused episode of The TT Show, Jak and Kosta break down and go through the crazy Helldivers 2 controversy on PC. If you were offline for a few days (and this all played out throughout a single weekend), the decision to force the Helddivers 2's PC players to link their Steam Account to a PlayStation Network (PSN) account caused a veritable backlash storm.

From the review bombing to developers being grilled to Sony and developer Arrowhead's damage control to the surprisingly swift happy ending, Jak and Kosta discuss the implications and consider what might happen in the aftermath.

This week's other big story comes from the world of Apple, with the company lifting the lid on its new iPad Pro lineup powered by the new AI-powered 3 nanometer M4 chip. The big thing here is that it represents Apple's first dip into the world of OLED displays, with a groundbreaking 1000-nit SDR and HDR screen that has two OLED panels in one!

Elon Musk has confirmed that SpaceX's Starlink satellite constellation was hit by a blast from the Sun, causing the satellites to buckle under "a lot of pressure".

SpaceX's constellation of Starlink satellites, which total nearly 6,000, managed to survive recent intense solar activity within Earth's upper atmosphere. More specifically, Elon Musk's SpaceX mentioned that a geomagnetic storm was causing "degraded service" for its Starlink satellites, which increases the density of Earth's upper atmosphere and can cause GPS communications to be scrambled.

However, all appears to be well, with SpaceX taking to its X account to announce that "All Starlink satellites on-orbit weathered the geomagnetic storm and remain healthy". Notably, this wasn't just any old geomagnetic storm, as conditions reached level 5 on the 5-point scale of geomagnetic activity on Friday, according to the Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC), which echoes the comments Musk made on his X account, "Major geomagnetic solar storm happening right now. Biggest in a long time."

OpenAI has unveiled a new AI model that is designed to analyze audio, visual and text, and provide answers based on what it "sees/hears".

The company behind the immensely popular AI tool ChatGPT announced its latest flagship model called GPT-4o (omni), which OpenAI describes as being a step towards a "much more natural human-computer interaction". The new AI model is expected to match the performance of GPT-4 Turbo at processing text and code input, while simultaneously being faster and 50% cheaper with its API, making it a more affordable choice for third-party app integration.

More specifically, users will be able to submit a query by voice about what the AI agent is able to "see" on the devices screen, and an example of this would be asking the AI what game two people can play. OpenAI demonstrated this with two people that verbally asked the AI "what game can we play". The AI used the smartphone camera to "see" the two people sitting in front of it and suggested playing rock, paper, scissors. The quick demonstration showed the AI model being able to fluently interact with the individuals and also be extremely responsive to interruptions and new commands.

Apple and Google announced they are teaming up to prevent users of both iOS and Android devices from being unwantedly tracked.

The two companies announced a new industry specification called "Detecting Unwanted Location Trackers" for Bluetooth tracking devices. This new specification will make it possible to alert iOS and Android users when one of their devices is being tracked, which is an effort by the companies to mitigate the misuse of devices such as Apple AirTag's being used nefariously. The new capability will be rolled out to iOS devices as part of Apple's iOS 17.5 update, and Google will launch the same feature on Android 6.0+ devices.

As for what iOS and Android users can expect to see when they are being unknowingly tracked, the newsroom post on Apple's website states, "users will now get an"[Item] Found Moving With You"alert on their device if an unknown Bluetooth tracking device is seen moving with them over time, regardless of the platform the device is paired with."

We reviewed the AVerMedia Live Gamer ULTRA 2.1 GC553G2 External Capture Card late last year. It was one of the first capture cards to offer full 4K 144 Hz HDMI 2.1 passthrough with HDR and VRR support. It earned our Editor's Choice Award as a "powerful USB streaming and capture solution for content creators" with excellent PC and console hardware support.

Today, we've got word from AVerMedia of an exciting new firmware update for the Live Gamer ULTRA 2.1 GC553G2 that adds an exciting new feature - 4K144 Capture on Windows devices via AVerMedia RECentral software or OBS. With most HDMI 2.1 capture cards topping out at 4K60 capture, the Live Gamer ULTRA 2.1 is even more impressive than it was when it first debuted.

The 4K144 option captures video using the MJPEG or Motion JPEG codec, which gives each frame its own relevant image file (so to speak) and should lead to impressive quality. No longer limited to just passthrough, the Live Gamer ULTRA 2.1 now offers creators and enthusiasts the option to record native 4K 144FPS gameplay.

TSMC hasn't been shy about saying it doesn't need ASML's bleeding-edge High-NA EUV lithography machines to make its next-generation A16 manufacturing process.

TSMC Senior VP Kevin Zhang spoke at a conference in Amsterdam this week, where he said TSMC's new A16 plants could be designed to accommodate the technology, but it's not certain... remember, TSMC is the world's biggest contract chipmaker, and the largest customer and user of ASML's regular EUV machines.

The future-generation A16 manufacturing process is under development right now, but TSMC wants to hit the market with A16 in the second half of 2026... and the company might not use ASML's new High-NA EUV lithography machines to do it. Zhang said: "I like the technology but I don't like the sticker price. When actually High NA EUV will come in play, I think it depends on where's the optimum economic and the technical balancing we can achieve".

NVIDIA's new Blackwell GPU architecture is going to make the company a lot of money, and while we know the B200 AI GPUs will cost $30,000 to $40,000 each -- CEO Jensen Huang said that just after the GPUs were announced -- but, the GB200 Superchip (CPU + GPU) will cost upwards of $70,000.

In a post on X by a senior writer at Barron's, the new NVIDIA GB200 Superchip will cost between $60,000 and $70,000. We already know that an NVIDIA DGX NVL72 AI server cabinet will cost $3 million per AI server, which gets filled with 72 x B200 GPUs and 36 x Grace CPUs.

The new NVIDIA DGX NVL72 is the AI server with the most computing power, and thus, the highest unit price. Inside, the DGX NVL72 features 72 built-in Blackwell-based B200 AI GPUs and 36 Grace CPUs (18 servers in total with dual Grace CPUs and 36 x B200 AI GPUs per server) with 9 switches. The entire cabinet is designed by NVIDIA in-house, and cannot be modified, it is 100% made, tested, and provided by NVIDIA.

The Sony PSP, or PlayStation Portable, is one of the most beloved gaming handhelds ever. Released in 2005, it received a backward-compatible follow-up in 2011, the PlayStation Vita. It sports a similar look and great PlayStation games from franchises like Final Fantasy, Uncharted, Metal Gear Solid, WipEout, and more.

With rumors pointing to Sony working with AMD to create a proper PSP follow-up with PS4-like performance, AYN Technologies, a creator of Android and Windows-based handhelds, is teasing a new lightweight 320-gram machine that looks exactly like a modern PSP.

The handheld has yet to be fully revealed, but it is rumored to be Android-based, so it can essentially play every PSP and PS Vita game via emulation. The most exciting thing about the new handheld, though, outside of the PSP shape, has to be the display.

In 2010, Rockstar Games released the classic open-world action-adventure western Red Dead Redemption for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Following the adventures of John Marston, a former outlaw, it presented a sprawling, bloody, and gritty look at life in the old West with the same charm and atmosphere as the studio's iconic Grand Theft Auto games.

Without a PC release, it's been one of those titles that PC gamers have been waiting to see for over a decade. Red Dead Redemption II got a PC port following its release in 2018, but the original has been one of those games seemingly lost to time - or limited to the console space.

In 2023, Red Dead Redemption received a modern remaster; however, this release was only for the PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch. Well, that looks to be changing, as the studio's PC Rockstar Games Launcher now includes hidden information stating that Red Dead Redemption and its Undead Nightmare expansion are "now playable on PC."

TSMC is urgently expanding its orders for CoWoS packaging equipment, with Taiwanese factories welcoming huge orders for equipment machines.

The unstoppable wave of AI is coming in many forms, with the AI GPUs and AI processors being made mostly at TSMC. TSMC estimates that the server AI processor revenue would more than double in 2024, accounting for around 11-13% of total revenue in 2024. However, server AI processors will account for 50% of annual revenue by 2029.

The server AI processor that TSMC mentions refers to the GPU, AI accelerator, and CPU that perform training and inference functions, but it does NOT include network, edge, or terminal device AI. TSMC emphasized at the North American Technology Forum that its 2.5D advanced packaging CoWoS (Chip-on-Wafer-on-Substrate) is a key driving technology for the AI revolution, which allows for more processor cores and HBM on a single interposer layer.

Samsung has reportedly failed to pass specific stages of HBM3E memory verification standards from NVIDIA, which is surely going to cause a headache for the South Korean memory giant.

SK hynix has been pumping out HBM3 and now HBM3E while still preparing not just the next-generation HBM4 memory, but even HBM4E memory... while South Korean HBM rival, Samsung, can't get its act together with HBM3 memory for NVIDIA according to Korean news outlet AlphaBiz.

Samsung has reportedly failed qualification tests for its HBM3 8-layer memory, which is a serious situation to be in considering how bleeding-edge HBM is, and how Samsung has been acting in an emergency-style manner to get its HBM business flourishing... and now this gigantic roadblock, as NVIDIA prepares its beefed-up Hopper H200 AI GPU, and next-generation Blackwell B100, B200, and GB200 AI GPUs which all use HBM3E memory.