Latest News - Page 1153

Millions of people have fled Ukraine after Russia began its invasion, and now some of those refugees are seeking asylum in the United States via Mexico's border.

Russia began its invasion of Ukraine on February 24 and triggered what is now considered to be the largest displacement crisis since World War II, causing 4.4 million refugees to flee the country to neighboring European countries. Not all refugees went to neighboring countries to flee Putin's war, as CBS reports that US border officials have processed nearly 10,000 undocumented Ukrainian refugees who traveled to Mexico and then to the US.

More specifically, between the dates of February 1 and April 6, the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported 9,926 Ukrainians that failed to have any legal documentation that is required to enter the US, according to unpublished CBS statistics. Notably, an individual close to the data told the publication that the Ukrainian refugees were attempting to cross the border through legitimate ports of entry and not illegally.

Anonymous announced the beginning of its cyberwar with Russia when Putin's forces started invading Ukraine, and now the collective has another update for the public.

Taking to its official Anonymous Twitter account, the hacking collective vowed that it would not stop its cyberwar with the Kremlin until Russia stops its aggression altogether. The recent update follows many previous updates of Anonymous revealing it had leaked the personal data of 120,000 Russian soldiers (April 3), and that it hacked the central bank of Russia and stole 35,000 files (March 24).

Notably, Anonymous has also claimed that it had hacked Russian streaming services Wink and Ivi and live TV channels such as Russia 24, Channel One, and Moscow 24 to broadcast war footage from Ukraine to show Russian citizens the horrors of Putin's invasion. Furthermore, the hacking collective said that it had infiltrated a censorship agency, government, corporate, and news websites.

Russia is currently attacking a key piece of Ukraine's space infrastructure, according to a recent report from NBC.

The report from NBC quotes the US Space Force, which says it's possible that Russia has positioned jammers around Ukraine that are interrupting the Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites regularly used for navigation and mapping. Notably, the jammers aren't targeting the satellites in space, but the devices used to receive the data, preventing them from receiving any usable signal.

Furthermore, David Thompson, the Space Force's vice chief of space operations, spoke to NBC and said that at the moment, Russia hasn't attacked any satellites in low-Earth orbit, but officials are monitoring the region for such a situation to unfold. Additionally, some areas in Ukraine are suffering from an internet shortage despite SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's generous donation of Starlink satellites.

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter reached Mars on in 2006 and was tasked with studying the Red Planet's geology and climate.

While the orbiter has done a great job at observing Mars' geology from a distance, it has also been put to other uses. NASA has pointed the HiRISE (High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) camera at the surface of Mars to spot the two newest members on Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover and martian helicopter Ingenuity, which together landed in early 2021.

The images taken by NASA's orbiter showcase a top-down view of Perseverance exploring the cracked surface of a rock formation called "Maaz", which translates from Navajo to English as "Mars". Located around 650 feet to the left of Perseverance is Ingenuity calmly seated on martian bedrock. Recently, Perseverance stumbled upon its own parachute and snapped some images that one Twitter user keenly caught. More on that story can be found here.

Antec has just added an all-new Dark Fleet DF800 FLUX mid-tower ATX gaming case, which has a wicked visual design on the front thanks to its geometrical mesh design and use of mirror surface materials.

Antec built the new cooling solution for its F-LUX Platform, explaining it: "When Intel and AMD announced their latest CPUs, they all deliver remarkable performance upgrades and better productivity, it also means the functional requirement of PC equipment needs to be taken to the next level, especially the thermal performance. To cope with the stress of enhanced heat dissipation, Antec developed a revolutionary structure for airflow, providing an improved and powerful cooling solution for your system. The F-LUX Platform".

There's an incredible amount of room inside of the Dark Fleet DF800 FLUX mid-tower ATX case, as well as a wicked amount of cooling -- 5 x 120mm fans to be exact -- enough to keep the most powerful CPU + GPU nice and cool, probably. Better yet: Antec gives you the 5 x 120mm ARGB fans with the case, all for $119.95.

NASA has confirmed that the largest comet ever observed has a diameter of about 85 miles and is now officially the largest comet ever seen after observations from the Hubble Space Telescope.

The comet is C/2014 UN271 (Bernardinelli-Bernstein (BB)) and was originally discovered in 2014 by two astronomers, Pedro Bernardinelli and Gary Bernstein, through archived images from the Dark Energy Survey. Previous estimates for the size of BB were anywhere between 62 and 124 miles, but now NASA has pointed the Hubble Space Telescope at the comet and confirmed the diameter of its nucleus to be 85 miles across.

NASA writes on its blog that BB has beaten the previous record-holder comet C/2002 VQ94 which has an estimated nucleus of 60 miles across. The space agency explains that the comet has been hurling toward Earth for 1 million years now and won't pose any threat to Earth when it makes its approach in 2031, where it won't come within a billion miles of Earth, or about the distance to Saturn.

3D modeling technology is being used in Ukraine to preserve culturally important heritage sites before a Russian attack potentially destroys them.

The initiative to map Ukraine's heritage sites was created by the smartphone app Polycam and is called "Backup Ukraine". The project aims to maintain Ukraine's cultural heritage and protect Ukraine's national identity through its citizens mapping out anything that has significant cultural value. So far, the project has created an archive that stores full 3D models of any object that anyone can view for at least the next five years, according to Polycam.

The website states that the project's goal is to "put this new technology in the hands of the citizens of Ukraine so that they may capture anything and everything that they deem culturally significant to preserve forever in 3D." Looking at the website, it can be seen that individuals have scanned a variety of different items from Russian tanks, cars, and classrooms to scooters and more.

Fortune has just released its annual list of the best companies to work for in 2022, with NVIDIA coming in the top 10 -- in fact, at #5 -- ahead of the likes of Capital One, and American Express.

Cisco takes the top spot, the second year in a row that the networking giant has been at the top, while Hilton comes in second, and Wegmans Food Markets, Inc. comes in third. Salesforce comes in fourth, and then NVIDIA is Fortune's #5 company to work for.

Michael C. Bush, CEO of Great Place to Work, a company that evaluates workplace culture said to Fortune: "Best Companies' leadership has never been more necessary. As workers struggle with the Great Resignation, burnout and COVID disruptions, these exceptional companies offer workplace experiences as strong as prior to the pandemic".

The new OnePlus Ace smartphone is going to have some seriously crazy-fast wired charging technology, with 150W fast wired charging.

The new OnePlus Ace series smartphone will be powered by the Dimensity 8100 SoC -- with a huge focus on super-fast charging and gaming -- which is where the 150W Super Flash Charging technology comes into play. OnePlus is also cramming in the Sony IMX766 camera sensor, while the back cover is "polished to a texture".

OnePlus is expected to outfit the OnePlus Ace with a 6.7-inch FHD+ display and punch-hole cutout for the selfie snapper, as well as a 4500mAh battery. There's not much to be impressed with here, but the crazy 150W charging is something I want to see -- and not see catch fire -- in the real-world. How long does that battery last?

Micron has announced the volume production of its new 16Gb GDDR6X memory modules, which are baked onto NVIDIA's new flagship GeForce RTX 3090 Ti graphics card.

The new 16Gb GDDR6X doesn't just have twice the capacity of Micron's previous 8Gb GDDR6X memory, but has 15% higher performance, and some OC wiggle room. On my MSI GeForce RTX 3090 Ti SUPRIM X graphics card, I could overclock the GDDR6X past its new stock 21Gbps bandwidth up to 24Gbps+ in ETH mining. You can see the results of that above.

Micron explains: "Today Micron extends its performance leadership by providing a new graphics memory with 16Gb capacity and running at an industry-best 21Gb/s in the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti. With a performance roadmap up to 24Gb/s, GDDR6X is ready for data-hungry applications of the future. Additionally, Micron's innovative use of PAM4 signal techniques in GDDR6X make it more power efficient than any of the GDDR6 products publicly available".

MSI has announced that its entire fleet of AIO liquid coolers are fully compatible with AMD's upcoming AM5 socket, which is where the new Zen 4-powered Ryzen 7000 series CPUs will call home.

MSI isn't the first -- Noctua has announced that pretty much every cooler they have is AM5-ready -- and they won't be the last to support the new AM5 socket with their existing products. AMD's new Zen 4-powered Ryzen 7000 series CPUs will be launching later this year, on the new AM5 socket (LGA 1718).

MSI explains: "AMD Socket AM5 (LGA 1718) is the next-generation socket designed to support next-generation Ryzen™ 7000 desktop processors (Zen 4). AMD Socket AM5 uses the same liquid cooler bracket as Socket AM4*. This allows you to upgrade to and enjoy AM5 without buying a new liquid cooler. *Requires motherboard's dedicated AMD Socket AM5 backplate".

Valve's new Steam Deck has been used in an awesome custom way: with its external GPU capability infused with the AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT graphics card with 16GB of GDDR6 memory.

The new Steam Deck was used by ETA Prime with a custom ASRock Radeon RX 6900 XT OC Formula graphics card, connected through the M.2 slot on the Steam Deck... as there is no Thunderbolt port to connect an external GPU. If you use the M.2 slot for an external GPU, then you will have to load your games from the microSD card inside of the Steam Deck, and not an M.2 SSD.

ETA Prime ran a bunch of benchmarks and games with some damn good results, including The Witcher 3 at 4K Ultra settings at 118FPS average... 4K 118FPS average. Sure, it's an external GPU running that... but it's being done through an M.2 slot, as an external GPU connected to a portable, and not-so-fast Steam Deck. Impressive to see.

AMD's new Ryzen 7 5800X3D processor is now in the wild, and has been tested with games at both 1080p and 720p resolutions: up against the Core i9-12900K processor.

XanxoGaming is the first on the scene with gaming benchmarks, with the team buying the Ryzen 7 5800X3D processor at retail, so there is no embargo in their way. AMD's new Ryzen 7 5800X3D processor has an MSRP of $449, meaning it costs around $120-$140 less than Intel's Core i9-12900K processor (if you buy 1000 units).

The team runs the Ryzen 7 5800X3D against the Core i9-12900K in Borderlands 3, Control, Death Stranding, F1 2020, Final Fantasy XV, Metro Exodus, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and The Witcher 3. AMD is keeping up with Intel and its Core i9-12900K thanks to its new 3D V-Cache technology inside of the Ryzen 7 5800X3D processor.

AMD's next-gen Zen 4 architecture will debut this year, powering the new Ryzen 7000 series CPUs inside of your PC... Zen 4 will be fabbed by TSMC on their new 5nm process node and will reportedly enter mass production this month.

We should expect AMD's new Ryzen 7000 series CPUs to drop sometime around September-October this year, competing directly with Intel's upcoming 13th Gen Core "Raptor Lake" CPUs. AMD should also be revealing its new Zen 4-powered CPUs alongside its new RDNA 3 graphics architecture.

AMD is reportedly tapping out its new Zen 4-based desktop CPUs at 16 cores and 32 threads, with a TDP of up to 170W. The codename "Raphael" CPUs will be using the Zen 4 architecture, utilizing TSMC's new 5nm and 6nm process nodes on its chiplet design. We should also expect the new AM5 socket (LGA 1718), DDR5 memory, and PCIe 5.0 support.

Microsoft is reportedly working on an Xbox Series X/S chip redesign that will help improve power efficiency and production readiness.

The Xbox Series X/S may get a chip refresh that boosts availability and supply, new reports from Brad Sams indicate. The new revision won't deliver more raw performance, though, and is expected to instead be on TSMC's N6 node which is actually part of its 7 nanometer family.

The next-gen Xbox duo currently use SoCs on TMSC's 7nm+ node, but the consoles are believed to move over to 6nm throughout 2022. Sony's PS5 is also expected to move to 6nm in an effort to maximize availability. The 6nm node offers multiple production benefits including better yields and quicker time-to-market, and the process of migrating chips from 7nm+ to 6nm is streamlined and easy.

Nintendo has announced major plans to create a new R&D facility in Japan to serve its growing video games business.

Nintendo has purchased a new plot of land in Kyoto to build a sizable research and development center with an area of 409,028 square feet and 246 feet tall. The company bid nearly $40 million to acquire the land in Kyoto, Japan, and the new R&D facility will be just a few feet away from Nintendo's main headquarters. The building project is expected to be completed in 2027.

R&D spending has been ramping up steadily throughout the years as the billion-dollar games-maker prepares new video game releases and the next iteration of its popular Switch handheld-console hybrid. The new Switch is expected to deliver 4K gaming powered by a new customized NVIDIA chip with DLSS support.

Prompted by Epic Games' donation campaign, Fortnite players have raised a whopping $144 million for Ukrainian relief through VBuck purchases.

A bit ago, Epic announced that it would donate all Fortnite microtransaction proceeds made in a 3-week period to humanitarian groups to help war-torn Ukraine. Now the campaign has ended and gamers have helped generate a staggering $144 million in revenues and profits across all platforms.

It's worth noting that the donation sum includes 100% of Xbox and PC revenues, whereas the 30% platform holder feeds have been deducted from Fortnite earnings on PlayStation, Switch, and mobile. Our records show that Fortnite traditionally makes around $297 million in revenues per month on all platforms, and earnings have undoubtedly spiked thanks to this donation campaign.

Halo The Master Chief Collection's player counts have jumped considerably following yesterday's big update.

343i just released a substantial update for Halo: MCC and players are returning en masse to try out new content like Halo 2 custom browser games and Floodfight. According to Steam DB, Halo: MCC's players are up 88% month-to-month following the update. In fact, the legacy game is nearly as popular as Halo Infinite.

Direct 24-hour peak player comparisons show that Halo: MCC had 8.297 users compared to Halo Infinite's 8,408 peak. Granted that Halo Infinite has been content-starved for many weeks now and should bounce back in May with the release of Season 2 Lone Wolves, but for now the playerbase has dropped some 96% since the game's launch.

Halo 3 ODST's new Floodfight gametype is one of the best things to ever come to the Master Chief Collection.

Yesterday 343 released a new update for the Master Chief Collection with a fusillade of content, changes, and fixes. Some of these were pretty big: Halo 2 is now visible on the custom games browser, campaign cross-play was added for Halo 3 and ODST, and there's a few mod adjustments. The headlining new feature was Floodfight, a new firefight gametype that introduced Halo 3's flood to my favorite game mode of all time.

Being a Firefight purist and having beta tested Floodfight, I was extremely skeptical on the new mode. Floodfight not only adds flood to traditional ODST Firefight maps, but it also packs in Halo 3 weapons like the battle rifle, assault rifle, and even the energy sword. This changes the meta considerably...but for the better. I'm elated to report that Floodfight is incredibly fun. In fact, it's the most fun I've ever had in Firefight.

Embracer Group CEO Lars Wingefors discusses how his decentralized digital empire mitigates risk by sheer breadth of content.

Lots of coverage has broken out about how Embracer plans to buy up more studios and companies, but this is par for the course for the European giant. Embracer isn't just a name--it's the group's raison d'etre. Of course it will buy up more developers, labels, etc. To date, Embracer has made 71 acquisitions worth over $8 billion, and Wingefors has previously confirmed more acquisitions will happen throughout 2022-23 but this time Embracer will be "more selective than ever," the CEO says.

In a recent Financial Times article, Wingefors said something that perfectly outlines Embracer's game plan. The group isn't trying to create one hit, but instead a myriad of titles that will help subsidize development costs, drive revenues, and eventually turn profits.