Latest News - Page 1663

One significant update to the 2020 iPad Pro was the inclusion of Apple's A12Z chipset for LiDAR. The LiDAR data the iPad Pro is gathering has been reported in the past by analyst Jon Prosser to not be all about the iPad itself. The data being collected is rumored to be used in the Apple Glass product for enhanced AR.

According to a recent leak, Apple intends to make a big push in the AR segment with its Apple Glass. The AR glasses are said to make use of data from its own integrated LiDAR sensor. It remains unclear if the iPad Pro is sending any AR data back to Apple to be used in the Apple Glass product in the future.

Apple is rumored to launch the Apple Glass AR device in 2021, meaning we are a ways out from real information on Glass. Apple has promoted the LiDAR scanner inside the iPad Pro for AR applications in the past. That capability allows users to overlay virtual objects with physical objects in their environment.

Blizzard commemorates Diablo II's 20th birthday but it just doesn't feel all that special.

Diablo II, one of the best games Blizzard has ever made, was launched 20 years ago today. Over two decades the game has fostered an immortal legacy that's inspired all of today's modern aRPG hits, from Path of Exile and Grim Dawn to Minecraft Dungeons. Sadly Blizzard has missed a golden opportunity to do something big for the game's 2-0 celebration.

Blizzard's way of celebrating Diablo II's 20th anniversary isn't with an in-game event, or a special occasion in Diablo III. The devs are basically relying on the existing D2 community to provide livestreams while also doing a few token things. There's also a cosmetic item in Diablo III and a fireside chat-style chat down memory lane that has a nice sentiment, but really isn't enough. They're even trying to sell you merch.

UPDATE: Ubisoft's teaser website for Hyper Scape is now live.

The devs have released the following images:

Ubisoft's next big game is Hyper Scape, a new ambitious free-to-play multiplayer BR that wants to compete against Apex Legends, Warzone, and PUBG.

Anyone starting to gear up for the back-to-school season, which will be here before you know it, needing a new laptop, might want to check out a Chromebook. Chromebook's typically have plenty of power for typical computing tasks that are performed in the office, at home, and school, while costing significantly less money. Lenovo has a nice Chromebook called the C340 that is a 15.6-in touch-screen two-in-one Chromebook.

Normally the machine sells for $449, but right now, Best Buy has it on sale with $100 discount bringing the price to $349. For the money, you get an Intel Pentium Gold processor, 4GB of RAM, and 64GB of flash storage. The screen is a larger 15.6-inch unit giving plenty of space.

The two-in-one design means the screen can fold back, and it can be used as a tablet. The Intel Pentium Gold processor is the 4417U model number operating at 2.3 GHz. Since the machine is a Chromebook, it runs Chrome OS (obviously). Other than low cost, another big benefit of a Chromebook is long battery life, and the C430 certainly delivers on that.

Sabrent has been going from strength to strength in the storage market lately, unleashing the world's first 8TB SSD (our review here) and now the company has just released the world's first external 8TB SSD.

The new Sabrent Rocket XTRM-Q 8TB is powered by Thunderbolt 3 or any USB port, offering a huge 2700MB/sec (2.7GB/sec) reads on Thunderbolt 3 while older USB you're going to see up to 900MB/sec. The drive is available in 500GB, 1TB, 2TB, 4TB, and 8TB capacities.

As for price, we're looking at $170, $220, $360, $830, and a huge $1600 for the 8TB flagship external SSD. The Sabrent Rocket XTRM-Q can detects between Thunderbolt 3 or USB automatically, with integrated temperature and health monitoring systems keeping tabs on your super-huge and super-fast external SSD.

NASA's $1 billion dollar space probe named Juno entered Jupiters orbit on July 4th, 2016, and now the small space probe has beamed back some of the most breathtaking images of the largest planet in our solar system.

Juno was sent over to Jupiter to observe the gas giants immense clouds and ultimately answer questions regarding how the planet came to be, and it's composition. Recently, Juno has relayed back some images of Jupiter that were captured back on April 10th. The space probe was travelling some 5,375 miles or, 8,650 kilometers over the clouds of Jupiter and at a latitude of about 50 degrees north. The images were processed by citizen scientist Kevin M. Gill, and can be found above and in the entirety of this article.

The images showcase several ravaging storms, and it should be noted that most of these storms are so large that they could completely swallow Earth as a whole in a matter of seconds. If you are wondering what Jupiter's atmosphere consists of, it is made up of helium and hydrogen gases. Throughout this trip, Juno became the fastest human-made object of all time as it reached speeds of up to 130,000 mph. If you are interested in checking out more images of Jupiter, you can have a look at NASA's library of images here.

NASA has been recorded the Sun for over 10 years now, and to celebrate that achievement it has released a 10-year time-lapse video.

The video was released onto NASA's "Goddard" official YouTube Channel, and explains that as of June 2020, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) has been watching the Sun "non-stop" for over a decade. Throughout that time, SDO has captured 425 million high-resolution images of the Sun that equates to a staggering 20 million gigabytes of data.

With all of these images, astronomers and scientists were able to acquire a more deeper understanding of the inner workings of our closest star. The 10-year time-lapse showcases photos that were taken at a wavelength of 17.1 nanometers, which is an extreme ultraviolet wavelength that reveals the Sun's outermost atmospheric layer, the corona. 10 years of images have been complied into a 61 minute video, which showcases both the turbulent beauty of the Sun, as well as its rise and fall in activity of its 11-year solar cycle. Do note, there are timestamps in the description of the video for the viewers accessible pleasure.

Sony has come out bragging up the 10.3 TFLOPs inside of its next-gen PlayStation 5 console, and while some say the PS5 is "technically" less powerful than Xbox Series X -- it's a fair chunk less powerful than Microsoft's new Xbox Series X.

The thing is that TFLOPs argument is crappy to begin with, as there's no way to directly compare the CPU/GPUs and their architecture and differences. They're both powerful consoles, but Microsoft has the much faster (and not just 'technically') console as it is nearly 20% more powerful -- if you wanted to use the TFLOPs argument, that is.

But now Director of Program Management for Xbox Series X, Jason Ronald, said during an interview published on Spanish site Xataka could've used the same things Sony did during its PS5 reveal and detailing of specs in the recent months.

AMD is set to launch its new 'Matisse Refresh' processors on July 7, 2020 with the Ryzen 5 3600XT, Ryzen 7 3800XT and Ryzen 9 3900XT -- with the latter two including a new free game.

According to a new rumor posted by our friends at VideoCardz, AMD will reportedly be bundling in Ubisoft's upcoming Assassin's Creed Valhalla game with 6 processors in teh Ryzen 3000 series of CPUs. This will include:

As for the new Ryzen XT series processors, we can expect around 5% faster speeds out of AMD's new Ryzen 9 3900XT over the 3900X -- you can read more on that here.

We are waiting with as much patience as possible for next-gen GPUs from both sides, with AMD ready to unleash with proper 4K gaming graphics cards in enthusiast-focused 'Big Navi' or now Navi 2X graphics cards later this year based on the new RDNA 2 architecture.

But what about Navi 31? What about something more monstrous than what's coming from AMD in the next few months? That's what we're hearing about today, with HardwareLeaks spotting references to 'Navi 31' inside of the macOS 11 GPU drivers.

This confirms that Apple and AMD are working together on something special, which is now known as Navi 31 -- a new high-end graphics card for the Mac. Apple just announced the new macOS during its recent (and virtual) WWDC conference earlier this week.

I'm sure you've probably heard that gigantic Twitch streamer Dr Disrespect was banned from Twitch just a few days ago and we all don't know why... and neither does Dr Disrespect himself, it seems. Check out his latest tweet:

He tweeted: "Champions Club, Twitch has not notified me on the specific reason behind their decision... Firm handshakes to all for the support during this difficult time".

We don't know why he was banned, and there's almost a huge conspiracy brewing around Dr Disrespect's sudden purge from Twitch. One reply to his tweet from 'Tameless_Gaming' has a 4chan conspiracy that gave me a chuckle:

A new report from French website Gameblog alleges Konami fired Kojima because he was secretly funneling money from Metal Gear Solid V to help fund Silent Hills, but Kojima Productions has squashed the report.

Back in 2015, Konami fired Hideo Kojima and scrubbed his name from Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. Konami also cancelled Silent Hills, a horror sequel Kojima was making alongside Guillermo Del Toro and Norman Reedus.

Ever since then Konami hasn't released a big AAA hit and has mostly focused on mobile, pachinko, and annualized sports games.

New MP and campaign details for Black Ops Cold War, this year's Call of Duty game, have leaked out ahead of the game's big reveal.

Activision has yet to reveal Black Ops Cold War yet, but that hasn't stopped multiple leaks from confirming key details. A recent pre-alpha gameplay clip confirmed the game's Cold War era setting along with various weapons and tanks used in the 80's. Now sources are coming forth with more info.

YouTuber xClusiveAce has some fresh tidbits concerning both multiplayer and campaign. The video has since been made private for obvious reasons, but Charlie Intel made a handy list.

Death Stranding might transform into a brand new IP and Kojima could already be working on a sequel.

Hideo Kojima is currently working with Yohi Shinkawa on early concepts for his next game...and it could be related to Death Stranding. Just yesterday Kojima shared some cryptic and strange sketches on Twitter of a Bridge Baby and a whale/dolphin-shaped ship, igniting speculation on Death Stranding 2.

Closer inspection reveals the Giger-esque craft to be a Landing Ship issued out by BRIDGES, the fictional inter-dimensional government from the ruinous world of Death Stranding. It's possible this ship floats in space or maybe even traverses the inky black oceans of the death stranding.

Microsoft's brick and mortar stores are becoming largely extinct as the company pivots even further into digital.

In a recent press release entitled "Microsoft Store announces new approach to retail," the service titan confirms it'll be closing all stores worldwide and those in in New York City, New York, Redmond, Washington, Sydney, Australia, and London, England will all evolve into Microsoft Experience Centers.

Interestingly enough, Microsoft says it won't fire anyone. MS Store staff will continue on and focus on digital sales, training, and tech support. This can also be done remotely, the company says.

New reports further solidify info on Microsoft's unannounced budget-friendly next-gen Xbox Series S console.

Microsoft may release two next-gen Xbox consoles in 2020: The higher-end and more expensive Xbox Series X (codenamed Anaconda) with a 12TFLOP GPU that targets 4K 120FPS max perf, and a cheaper digital-only Xbox Series S (codenamed Lockhart) that targets 1440p 60FPS perf.

Now we have more info to corroborate these reports. Sources tell The Verge's Tom Warren that the Xbox Series S will have roughly 1/3rd of the Series X's GPU power. Lockhart is expected to ship with a 4TFLOP Navi GPU complemented by 10GB of GDDR6 RAM, of which 7.5GB will be usable for games.

Bill & Ted Face the Music was originally due for August 13, 2020 -- but the time travel movie has had some experiences with time it seems, with MGM delaying Bill & Ted Face the Music two weeks until August 28, 2020 -- and it's because of Tenet.

Warner Bros. delayed the release of Christopher Nolan's new movie (again) by two weeks, with a new opening of August 12, 2020 -- the day before Bill & Ted Face the Music was meant to debut. This forced MGM to push their movie back two weeks until August 28, 2020.

Bill & Ted Face the Music will have the original stars of the two first cult classic movies, with Bill & Ted themselves in Keanu Reeves (star of The Matrix and John Wick franchies -- each with new movies coming out, both with Reeves in them once again) and Alex Winter.

Tenet has been pushed back yet again, with the epic new movie from Inception, Dark Knight, Interstellar director Christopher Nolan delayed until August 12, 2020.

Warner Bros. announced the news in the last 24 hours, which marks the second delay for Tenet. It was first meant to arrive on July 17, 2020 but then Tenet was pushed back two weeks until July 31. But now it has been delayed again, from July 31 to August 12 -- another 12 days.

A Warner Bros. spokesperson said in a statement: "Warner Bros. is committed to bringing 'Tenet' to audiences in theaters, on the big screen, when exhibitors are ready and public health officials say it's time. In this moment what we need to be is flexible, and we are not treating this as a traditional movie release. We are choosing to open the movie mid-week to allow audiences to discover the film in their own time, and we plan to play longer, over an extended play period far beyond the norm, to develop a very different yet successful release strategy".

Well, things just got serious with the Coca-Cola Company pulling the plug -- at least temporarily -- on all digital advertising across all social media platforms globally for at least 30 days.

The global soda giant announced the news late Friday night, saying it would pause digital advertising on social platforms for 30 days beginning July 1, 2020. What's the reason? A boycott of Facebook and Instagram that has been organized by the Anti-Defamation League, the NAACP, and other organizations that have morphed into the "Stop Hate for Profit" campaign.

The Coca-Cola Company only talked about removing advertising on Facebook and Instagram, but we should see the boycotts affecting Twitter, YouTube, and other social media platforms.

The Boys was one of the best surprise TV shows of 2019, debuting on Amazon Prime Video and being the kinda anti-superhero and Bizarro versions of the Justice League and Avengers. Well, the first season was a huge hit (I loved it) and now season two is getting close to debuting.

Amazon has now confirmed that the second season of The Boys will debut on September 4, 2020 -- on this day they'll unload 3 new episodes to get you hooked. After that, episodes of the second season of The Boys will drop each Friday through to the season finale on October 9, 2020.

The company teased a blood-soaked trailer for season two in December 2020, but now the first clip from The Boys Season 2 is here and it looks great. We're being introduced to Stormfront, a new hero that will be an interesting foe (and friend) to the superbly played Homelander by Antony Starr.