Micron 3500 1TB SSD Review - The OEM Champ

Micron 3500 1TB SSD Review - The OEM Champ

Today, Micron launches a new OEM SSD, the Micron 3500. This SSD brings 2400 MT B58R and is easily the most potent OEM client SSD ever offered.

TT Show Episode 13 - JerryRigEverything, RTX 4090 sold as AI GPU, OLED burn-in study, and more!

Kosta Andreadis | TweakTown | Dec 1, 2023 10:58 PM CST

The TT Show is back, and Episode 13 covers a big week of news and fun happenings in the tech, gaming, and science space. This week, Jak and Kosta dive into the YouTube channel JerryRigEverything's lawsuit against a billion-dollar company, how the final batch of GeForce RTX 4090 GPUs in China are being repurposed for AI, and how a new rigorous study into OLED panels is ultimately good news even if the results show that all OLED displays eventually show signs of burn-in.

TT Show Episode 13 - JerryRigEverything, RTX 4090 sold as AI GPU, OLED burn-in study, and more!

Oh, and then there's the curious case of Ubisoft's 'technical error' where players saw in-game full-screen pop-up ads while playing Assassin's Creed! The duo also looks at the state of cloud gaming and services like GeForce NOW, which NVIDIA is increasingly pushing to gain a foothold. And with the shift to the cloud and all things digital, there's also a lengthy tangent all about the importance of physical media in an age where content can disappear.

On the fun side, you definitely want to listen or watch the full episode as the final story involves a Meta Quest 3 and "magical pooping." And, as always, a little bit of GrandTheft auto 6 talk. The latest episode of TweakTown's official podcast can be viewed above or listened to on your favorite podcast service around the globe.

Continue reading: TT Show Episode 13 - JerryRigEverything, RTX 4090 sold as AI GPU, OLED burn-in study, and more! (full post)

Engineers build the first wireless-charging public road in the US for electric vehicles

Jak Connor | Electric Vehicles & Cars | Dec 5, 2023 6:16 AM CST

The road will be able to wirelessly charge electric vehicles while they are stationed, idling, and even driving. But where is it?

Engineers build the first wireless-charging public road in the US for electric vehicles

A team of engineers have installed what's being described as the United States' first wireless-charging road that involves the use of copper inductive charging coils positioned beneath the road to charge electric vehicles.

The road is located in west downtown Detroit and stretches a quarter mile of 14th Street. Engineers plan on using this location as somewhat of a testing ground for the technology, and will make the road available to the public within a few years, per the Michigan Department of Transportation.

Continue reading: Engineers build the first wireless-charging public road in the US for electric vehicles (full post)

AOC launches two new ultrawide gaming monitors under its AGON line

Jak Connor | Displays & Projectors | Dec 5, 2023 5:53 AM CST

AOC has announced it will be launching two new ultrawide gaming monitors that will have the same resolution, but one has a better refresh rate.

AOC launches two new ultrawide gaming monitors under its AGON line

If you are in the market for a new gaming monitor and have always been curious about picking up an ultrawide display, take a look at AOC's AGON line-up and, in particular, the CU34G2XE and CU34G2XP. AOC's AGON line has proved the company is dedicated to producing high-quality gaming monitors at an affordable price. It's able to do this by concentrating on the specifications that truly matter to gamers, such as resolution, refresh rate, and response time.

First up, we have the CU34G2XE, a VA panel display that comes with a curvature of 1500R, a 21:9 aspect ratio, 3440 x 1440 (WQHD) resolution, a 144Hz refresh rate, and a 1ms response time (MPRT). This ultrawide comes with support for HDR10 and comes equipped with DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.0. Next is the CU34G2XP, and while being an extremely similar gaming monitor by coming with all of the aforementioned features of the CU34G2XE, the CU34G2XP separates itself with an increased refresh rate of 180Hz, two DisplayPort 1.4 ports, and two HDMI 2.0 ports.

Continue reading: AOC launches two new ultrawide gaming monitors under its AGON line (full post)

Tesla's Cybertruck requires an extra big battery to hit the range Elon Musk promised

Jak Connor | Electric Vehicles & Cars | Dec 5, 2023 4:03 AM CST

Tesla has started making deliveries of the highly anticipated Cybertruck, and while it's incredible to finally see the strange new EV take to the streets, the finalized version is slightly different than the one that was initially promised.

Tesla's Cybertruck requires an extra big battery to hit the range Elon Musk promised

Tesla's CEO Elon Musk initially promised consumers that they would be able to purchase a 500-mile range Cybertruck for just $69,900, and, unfortunately, the one that was showcased on the Cybertruck Delivery Event was quite different than what was first mentioned. The $69,900 Cybertruck has a total range of 250 miles, and the top-tier Cyberbeast has a total range of 320 miles.

To account for the discrepancy between what was initially promised, Tesla has announced a range extender that comes in the form of a battery pack that takes up 1/3 of the truck bed. Elon Musk took to X to explain the range extender is "meant for very long trips or towing heavy things up mountains". The optional range extender increases the Cybertruck's range by 120 miles, which would bring the Cyberbeast, a $100,000 vehicle, to 440 miles. Sixty miles short of what was originally promised.

Continue reading: Tesla's Cybertruck requires an extra big battery to hit the range Elon Musk promised (full post)

Spotify announces it's firing 17% of its total staff due to the 'challenges ahead'

Jak Connor | Business, Financial & Legal | Dec 5, 2023 3:19 AM CST

In what marks the third time this year, Spotify has announced it will be laying off 1,500 employees that have already been notified of their departure.

Spotify announces it's firing 17% of its total staff due to the 'challenges ahead'

The news of the layoffs comes from company CEO Daniel Ek, who explained in a newsroom post that the cuts of 17% of the company's workforce was decidedly made to be immediate instead of incrementally over time. This decision was made by Ek, who wrote that he considered Spotify's financial goal state and its current operational costs, and elected to "right-size our costs" to "accomplish our objective".

Additionally, Ek explained that the workforce reduction of this caliber might come as a surprise to many employees considering the "recent positive earnings report and our performance". However, Spotify's CEO writes that this decision was made to close the gap "between our financial goal state and our current operational costs."

Continue reading: Spotify announces it's firing 17% of its total staff due to the 'challenges ahead' (full post)

23andMe was hacked and ancestry data on 6.9 million users was stolen

Jak Connor | Science, Space, Health & Robotics | Dec 5, 2023 2:42 AM CST

Last Friday, genetic testing company 23andMe announced it was hacked, and the personal data of 0.1% of its customers, or 14,000 people, were stolen.

23andMe was hacked and ancestry data on 6.9 million users was stolen

However, that isn't the worst of the news, as the company has said that due to the hackers accessing those accounts, they were able to gain access to a "significant number of files containing profile information on other users' ancestry."

What was the number of "other users"? In an email sent to TechCrunch, 23andMe spokesperson Katie Watson confirmed the hackers were able to gain access to the personal information of 5.5 million people who chose to opt-in to 23andMe's DNA Relatives feature.

Continue reading: 23andMe was hacked and ancestry data on 6.9 million users was stolen (full post)

NASA's most powerful space telescope captured a mysterious 'ghostly' object

Jak Connor | Science, Space, Health & Robotics | Dec 5, 2023 2:17 AM CST

The world's most powerful space telescope, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, has honed its extremely sensitive instruments on a mysterious object millions of light years away from Earth.

NASA's most powerful space telescope captured a mysterious 'ghostly' object

The object in question is officially called AzTECC71, a dusty star-forming galaxy that dates back to the early stages of the universe, nearly 1 billion years after the occurrence of the Big Bang. Notably, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope was unable to see the galaxy with its instruments, but follow-up observations from Webb has captured a faint image of the distant galaxy, revealing qualities that previously went unnoticed.

Webb has captured an image of one of the oldest objects in the known universe, and while that is exciting in itself, astronomers are more excited for the implications of such a discovery - stellar nurseries like AzTECC71 could be three to ten times more common than previously thought.

Continue reading: NASA's most powerful space telescope captured a mysterious 'ghostly' object (full post)

Amazon's new AI has gone haywire and is 'leaking confidential data'

Jak Connor | Artificial Intelligence | Dec 5, 2023 1:35 AM CST

Earlier this week, Amazon announced it was jumping into the AI chatbot arms race with its own chatbot called Q.

Amazon's new AI has gone haywire and is 'leaking confidential data'

Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced that Q isn't designed to directly compete with goliath AI-powered tools developed by OpenAI, such as ChatGPT, but instead will go head to head against Microsoft's AI developer assistant called Copilot. AWS CEO Adam Selipsky announced that Amazon Q would be the AI assistant businesses would query about their business using their own business data. Examples of this would be employees asking Q about relevant company information and sifting through large swaths of data.

Leaked documents obtained by Platformer has revealed that Q has begun to suffer "severe hallucinations" and is, unfortunately, "leaking confidential data". Notably, this wasn't just a small leak of confidential data, as reports indicate AWS engineers were forced to work through the weekend to repair an error labeled "sev 2". This error actually leaked the locations of AWS data centers and unreleased features.

Continue reading: Amazon's new AI has gone haywire and is 'leaking confidential data' (full post)

Grand Theft Auto 6 seems it has an in-game social media and livestreaming platform

Jak Connor | Gaming | Dec 5, 2023 1:16 AM CST

Rockstar Games has finally released the first trailer for what could be the most anticipated game of all time - Grand Theft Auto VI.

Grand Theft Auto 6 seems it has an in-game social media and livestreaming platform

The 90-second trailer was published early on the Rockstar Games YouTube channel and showcased a great deal of the game, revealing many impressive aspects such as graphical quality, density of environments while maintaining impressive graphics, the main character, and the location of the game. While these are the main takeaways from the trailer, I believe there is something here most people have missed - a brand new feature that players of GTA VI will have to learn to adapt to in-game.

One of the main things we see during the trailer is videos played on what seems to be some kind of social media platform. The clips begin with a video posted by "DadBodSquad" and show a man partying on a boat. Next to the account name is a Follow option, along with a Like and Comment option in the top right. These types of videos are constantly played throughout the trailer, which makes me think that perhaps this is more than a quick way to showcase different aspects of the game.

Continue reading: Grand Theft Auto 6 seems it has an in-game social media and livestreaming platform (full post)

Grand Theft Auto 6 looks to be skipping PC at launch, will it arrive in 2026?

Kosta Andreadis | Gaming | Dec 5, 2023 12:38 AM CST

Rockstar dropped the first Grand Theft Auto VI trailer earlier today, and if you haven't seen it yet, be sure to stop reading and watch it below. Pretty amazing, right? The insane level of detail in everything from the characters to the environments to the lighting is next level, and that's before you factor in the awesome animation and vehicles.

Grand Theft Auto 6 looks to be skipping PC at launch, will it arrive in 2026?

And with the GTA 6 drought finally over, we've also got a release window - 2025. However, it's not great news if you're a PC gamer rocking a decent GeForce RTX or Radeon RX rig.

Alongside the trailer, we got a press release from Rockstar Games stating it's "proud to announce that Grand Theft Auto VI is coming to PlayStation 5 computer entertainment systems and Xbox Series X|S games and entertainment systems in 2025." That's right, no PC.

Continue reading: Grand Theft Auto 6 looks to be skipping PC at launch, will it arrive in 2026? (full post)

AMD, Intel, Qualcomm want AI PCs to change the industry, 'killer apps' for AI are coming

Anthony Garreffa | Artificial Intelligence | Dec 4, 2023 11:09 PM CST

The search for "killer apps" for AI is on, leading up to the AI PC revolution that will kickstart with Windows 12 from Microsoft and the evolution of AI inside of our PCs starting in 2024.

AMD, Intel, Qualcomm want AI PCs to change the industry, 'killer apps' for AI are coming

We've seen the meteoric rise of generational AI advances from the likes of OpenAI, with Microsoft offering its own AI-powered service with Copilot, something we'll be seeing much more of as we ramp into the release of Windows 12. AMD has been at the forefront of AI processors with Ryzen AI out earlier this year, Intel has an AI-dedicated chip on its upcoming Meteor Lake CPUs, and Qualcomm has AI on-board for its upcoming Snapdragon SoC for Windows devices.

It's all systems go for AI, AI, AI... and now we're hearing about tech companies lusting after that elusive "killer app" of AI, because we all know it's going to come down to the best apps built for AI. Think of like, Angry Birds but for AI. Or the Tetris of AI. The Mario Kart (64) of AI. It's coming, and tech companies want it.

Continue reading: AMD, Intel, Qualcomm want AI PCs to change the industry, 'killer apps' for AI are coming (full post)