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Resident Evil 7 demo patched with improved HBAO+, more

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 28, 2016 6:33 PM CST

If you haven't played through the Resident Evil 7 demo, you really need to - it looks awesome, and teases what could be a fresh injection of new into the franchise when it lands in less than a months time.

Capcom have patched the Resident Evil 7 demo with support for CPUs without SSE4.1 technology (AMD Phenom, and Intel Core 2 series CPUs), as well as some performance improvements with HBAO+. The new patch will also fix issues surrounding the screen size change, when switching from full screen to windowed mode - should now be fixed.

Resident Evil 7 PC Demo Patch Changelog:

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Continue reading: Resident Evil 7 demo patched with improved HBAO+, more (full post)

Windows 10's new Game Mode to boost PC game performance

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 28, 2016 5:28 PM CST

Microsoft is apparently working on a new Windows 10 'game mode' that's designed to optimize the performance of PC games on a system-wide hardware and OS level.

Windows 10's new Game Mode to boost PC game performance

According to Windows Central, the new Windows 10 'game mode' will "enhance the PC gaming experience by minimizing resources used by running apps to almost nothing and allocating freed up resources to the game, making it run faster, better and smoother overall."

We're not sure if Game Mode will be available across all PC games, or if it'll be an exclusive feature of Microsoft's UWP Windows Store PC games--likely the latter, as Microsoft is keen on pulling more gamers to its unified framework, and this will be a pretty hefty incentive if it's done right.

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Tesla's autonomous tech detects an accident in 1 second

Anthony Garreffa | Electric Vehicles & Cars | Dec 28, 2016 4:35 PM CST

Tesla recently released its new Autopilot v8.0 technology in September, with the company teasing its new radar processing technology that was pushed out over-the-air to all of its electric vehicles with the first-gen Autopilot hardware.

This new update allows the system to see ahead of the car in front of you, tracking multiple cars on the road - as it's able to bounce underneath, or around the car in front of the Tesla. There haven't been any videos of this taking place, but unfortunately - today it happened, and for the Tesla Model S owner Hans Noorsdij had his vehicle avoid an accident for him.

Tesla's Autopilot Forward Collision Warning can be heard sending an alert out for something, and less than a second later a massive accident happens, with the Model S coming to a safe, and to a not-so-abrupt stop. Amazingly, everyone "turned out to be OK" after the accident - even with the SUV rolling over. We now have an amazing demonstration of what Tesla's still-early-days Autopilot technology is capable of in the real-world.

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Nintendo Switch: Type-C quick charge, no LTE, 5GHz Wi-Fi

Derek Strickland | Gaming | Dec 28, 2016 3:48 PM CST

Nintendo's new Switch handheld-console hybrid has been certified by the FCC, showing some interesting new features such as a non-removable 3.7V Lithium Ion battery, 5GHz Wi-Fi, the apparent requirement of an Ethernet to USB adapter for wired internet connections, USB Type-C fast-charging while docked, and more.

Nintendo Switch: Type-C quick charge, no LTE, 5GHz Wi-Fi

Check below for a breakdown of all the info including in the Switch's FCC filing, as well as source documentation, but also remember that the FCC filing was based on a Nintendo Switch devkit. The filings ascertain that the HAC-001, aka the Nintendo Switch's model number, matches the final hardware that will ship in March 2017.

*Basic formula to convert volts to watts is Watts = Volts x Amps, so we plug in the Switch's 15V times the 2.6A to get 39W, meaning the Switch will draw a max of 39W while docked.

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Continue reading: Nintendo Switch: Type-C quick charge, no LTE, 5GHz Wi-Fi (full post)

Motherboard makers are excited for AMD's new Ryzen CPUs

Anthony Garreffa | Motherboards | Dec 28, 2016 2:28 PM CST

I've been excited for AMD's next-gen Zen CPU architecture since day one, and that excitement has built up over the last 12 months into the official Ryzen CPU architecture AMD teased earlier this month.

Ryzen will rock up to 16 threads of CPU performance with an 8-core processor starting at 3.4GHz, and performance in the levels of the Core i7-6800K and 6900K from Intel. Now we're hearing that motherboard makers have been "rather aggressive about placing orders" for Ryzen-capable motherboards, as they "believe demand for the new platform will increase AMD's share in the worldwide desktop processor market in the second quarter of 2017", reports DigitTimes.

Better yet, we're getting an idea of how far along the Ryzen CPU and compatible motherboards are, with DigiTimes' report continuing: "The sources pointed out that they have started receiving high-end X370, mainstream B350 and entry-level A320 chipsets from AMD and are now in the final stage of finishing related testing and motherboard designing".

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AMD teases next-gen Radeon RX series, Vega is coming

Anthony Garreffa | Graphics Cards | Dec 27, 2016 10:06 PM CST

AMD appears to be ringing in the New Year bell a little early this year, with a tease on the official Twitter account for Radeon, with a simple tweet of "New Year. New architecture", teasing its next-gen Vega GPU architecture.

AMD teases next-gen Radeon RX series, Vega is coming

AMD recently held their Tech Summit 2016 event in Sonoma, California - with our first look at a Vega 10-based graphics card with 8GB of HBM2, capable of driving DOOM at 4K 60FPS+ on its highest graphics settings.

It was only a week ago that a Vega 10 GPU of some sort received RRA certification, but so did a 'Polaris 12' graphics chip, too. Performance wise, we should expect Titan X level performance from a Vega 10 graphics card with 8GB of HBM2, and most likely ready to compete against NVIDIA's unannounced and unconfirmed - but teased GeForce GTX 1080 Ti.

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Continue reading: AMD teases next-gen Radeon RX series, Vega is coming (full post)

Tesla's next-gen charger will charge its cars in minutes

Anthony Garreffa | Electric Vehicles & Cars | Dec 27, 2016 6:30 PM CST

If there's one thing that electric cars need, it's faster charging - and it looks like that's in the immediate future for Tesla Motors. Elon Musk, or the real life Tony Stark, has teased that the next generation is Superchargers will be pushing somewhere above 350kW.

Musk fielded some questions over Twitter, Fred Lambert suggesting that Supercharger V3 will have 350kW output - but Musk had the reply of a lifetime, teasing: "A mere 350 kW ... what are you referring to, a children's toy?". If Tesla does indeed hit a doubling in power output, charging up their growing family of electric cars could be faster than ever before.

We could be looking at a stop at the service station, or a specific carpark, being able to charge your Tesla electric vehicle in minutes - impressive stuff.

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LG's new Bluetooth speaker levitates, for real

Anthony Garreffa | Audio | Dec 27, 2016 4:27 PM CST

LG will be teasing something really quite futuristic during CES 2017 next week, with an easily-named "Levitating Portable Speaker"... which is exactly what it sounds like - a levitating speaker.

The upcoming Levitating Portable Speaker is an egg-shaped Bluetooth unit that has a round base, something LG calls the Levitation Station. The aptly-named Levitation Station (seriously, give that person a raise) includes electromagnets that provide the floating effect, as well as a subwoofer for bass. LG touts 360-degree sound with a 10-hour battery life, and it's also rated IPX7 for water resistance.

The coolest thing out of it all is that the speaker will automatically descend into the base when it needs to recharge, and I will buy one as soon as I can to test that out. Awesome stuff, LG.

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Crytek will pay unpaid wages by January 13

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 27, 2016 12:29 PM CST

We've been reporting about Crytek more than ever before, with mostly bad things - but then a great spark of excitement from a nearly secured $500 million investment from the Turkish government - and now, we have confirmation on Crytek developers' unpaid wages.

According to an industry insider friend of ours, TweakTown can exclusively reveal that Crytek will pay 100% of their unpaid staff to all unpaid staff by January 13, 2017. This is just over two weeks from now, which I'm sure will coincide with Crytek's recent $500 million deal with the Turkish government. Not only that, but Crytek reportedly holds no debt - which means it should effectively be very steady with this new load of cash coming in, for what will hopefully be a very long time.

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Continue reading: Crytek will pay unpaid wages by January 13 (full post)

Google Pixel freezes for minutes at a time, even for me

Anthony Garreffa | Mobile Devices | Dec 27, 2016 2:35 AM CST

Google might be spending tens of millions of dollars on advertising for its new Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones, but people are experiencing issues all over the place - including me. Even after AUD$1249 outright, to say I'm mad at the situation of my Pixel malfunctioning like this being disappointing, would be an understatement.

In the last week my Pixel has been really quite bad, matching up with reports online that Pixel owners have been having their phone freeze, and you can't do anything with it - and it takes up to 60 seconds before the phone starts working, very randomly. The only way to get out of it is to hard reset Pixel by pressing the power and volume down buttons at the same time, and holding them down for 10 seconds.

Not only that, but I've been noticing glitches with the camera and the fingerprint sensor not recognizing my fingerprint. A few weeks ago I was sitting in the cinema watching Arrival and at the end of the movie, I went to unlock my Pixel with my fingerprint - which was rejected, and so was my 4-digit security code. I couldn't get into my Pixel at all, and had to hard reset and wipe the entire smartphone and start again.

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Continue reading: Google Pixel freezes for minutes at a time, even for me (full post)

Apple's spaceship campus detailed in 4K drone footage

Anthony Garreffa | Business, Financial & Legal | Dec 26, 2016 10:29 PM CST

Apple will be opening up its new spaceship campus is nearing completion, with a beautiful 4K video shot with his drone, providing a Christmas/New Year update for us all. Check it out.

The footage looks great, showing that Apple is using 100% renewable energy for the campus, with the entire ring around Apple's new HQ plastered with solar panels. Matthew Roberts, the person behind the 4K drone footage said that there's around 65% of the total solar panels installed so far.

Apple has designed the campus where it will feature 3000 specially designed, and engineered curved glass panels that will measure in at around one mile in circumference. Steve Jobs said during a Cupertino City Council meeting a few years ago: "There's not a single straight piece of glass in this building. We've used our experience in building retail buildings all over the world. We know how to make the biggest pieces of glass for architectural use. And, we want to make the glass specifically for this building here. We can make it curve all the way around the building... It's pretty cool".

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Continue reading: Apple's spaceship campus detailed in 4K drone footage (full post)

Oculus engineer arrested soliciting sex from 15-year-old

Anthony Garreffa | Business, Financial & Legal | Dec 26, 2016 9:11 PM CST

Oculus is in the headlines for all the wrong reasons today, with Oculus' Head of Computer Vision Dov Katz being arrested in a sting involving a police officer who was posting as a 15-year-old girl.

TechCrunch reports that Katz meeting with what he thought was a 15-year-old girl at Embassy Suites in Tukwila, Washington - aftrer he had text messaged the 15-year-old girl agreeing to pay $300 with her for sex without a condom. The police officer pretended to be a 19-year-old who, closer to the time of meeting Katz, said she was being honest and act ually a 15-year-old. The Oculus engineer responded saying "sure", adding: "do you have another pic?".

Some sickening stuff right there, with Katz ending being arrested without incident, with $600 found in the room along with his smartphone. The police officer in question said he arrested Katz for 'Commercial sexual abuse of a minor', but Katz said he was a hero, and instead was "there to rescue her and call the police".

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Crytek to receive $500m investment from Turkish gov

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 26, 2016 7:47 PM CST

Crytek have had a turbulent year, but with the news that Turkish government will be investing a massive $500 million into the German developer, something Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım announced on December 24, without naming Crytek.

PM Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım did say that three brothers living in Germany, "who own a leading company in the gaming sector, were planning to invest in Turkey during his speech at the "Turkey's 500 Large Service Exporters" ceremony", according to reports.

The three brothers in question are Cevat, Avni, and Faruk Yerli - who founded Crytek in 1999. The company spread into Istanbul, Budapest, Kiev, Seoul, Shanghai, and Sofia, but closed 5 of them just days ago. Crytek recently said the closures were so that it could refocus on its core strengths, developing innovating games and the technology that drives them.

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Intel's Core family retired in 2019, next-gen x86 coming

Anthony Garreffa | Processors | Dec 26, 2016 6:09 PM CST

The holidays can be an interesting time, with Intel rumored to be retiring its Core family of processors in 2019 with the release of Tiger Lake, which will be succeeded with a more efficient, faster approach to the x86 architecture.

Bitsandchips.it is reporting that Intel's next CPU family will be similar to what AMD has done with its Zen architecture, blending in power consumption/performance /price - and in order to save physical space (smaller die), and improve the power consumption/performance ratio, Intel will reportedly get rid of old SIMD and legacy hardware.

This means that we might not have 100% backwards compatibility, but these CPUs won't be here until 2020 - a long time from now. Intel will be able to make a lean, efficient x86 architecture that will compete with AMD's nearly-here Zen architecture. What I'm taking away from this is that AMD will be ahead of the game for a few years until Intel can get their act together with a new architecture to begin competing against the star-studded launch of Zen.

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Continue reading: Intel's Core family retired in 2019, next-gen x86 coming (full post)

Huawei Mate 9 now comes in a new color

Lana Jelic | Mobile Devices | Dec 26, 2016 4:35 PM CST

The Huawei Mate 9, unveiled in November, already comes in multiple colors, but the Chinese giant has now added another one - obsidian black.

Other than the new color, the specs of the phone remain the same - Kirin 960 chip, 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage. The phone has a 5.9-inch full HD display, 4,000 mAh battery, fingerprint sensor and rear-dual camera system - 20MP (monochrome) + 12MP (color) with an aperture of f/2.2. The front camera is 8MP with an aperture of f/1.9.

The phone is also available in gray, silver, gold, brown and white color at a price of $776.

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Resident Evil 7 runs at 1080p 60FPS on Xbox One, PS4

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 26, 2016 1:58 AM CST

Resident Evil 7 is not even a month away now, with its producer, Masachika Kawata teasing that both the Xbox One and PS4 versions of the game will run at 1080p and 60FPS.

Not only that, but Resident Evil 7 includes HDR support for the Xbox One S, PS4 and PS4 Pro consoles. During his interview with Gaming Bolt, Kawata talked about the new PS4 Pro and upcoming Xbox Scorpio consoles, where he said: "When it comes to new hardware, I think that the biggest takeaway is just making sure that it's not just one party that is excited about this product".

He added: "It really has to be a mutual interest on both the manufacturer side, publisher side, [and] consumer side. And only when everyone is on board and everyone's excited for the product does it allow the opportunity to expand the game industry and the user base. Because otherwise it's just a lot of extra effort on our side".

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Continue reading: Resident Evil 7 runs at 1080p 60FPS on Xbox One, PS4 (full post)

Shadow of Mordor now runs dynamic 4K res on PS4 Pro

Anthony Garreffa | Gaming | Dec 25, 2016 11:24 PM CST

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor has been updated on the PS4 Pro, which now runs along at up to 4K - at least most of the time, and when it doesn't it gets knocked down to 1080p.

The developer has included "Favor Quality" which clocks the PS4 Pro into 1080p mode on Shadow of Mordor, of "Favor Resolution" at 4K. Choosing the 1080p version will lock Shadow of Mordor on the PS4 Pro at 1080p with enhanced graphical quality, while selecting 4K will dynamically scale the game up to 4K.

Don't own a 4K TV? That's fine, Shadow of Mordor will run at 1080p with super sampling enabled for a better looking experience.

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Continue reading: Shadow of Mordor now runs dynamic 4K res on PS4 Pro (full post)

'Alien Covenant' releases first bloody trailer

Ben Gourlay | Celebrities & Entertainment | Dec 25, 2016 8:22 PM CST

Merry Christmas, Alien fans! Ridley Scott's much anticipated follow-up to 2012's 'Prometheus' has just released its first red-band trailer. But be warned - it's not for the faint of heart.

According to Scott, 'Alien: Covenant' is set to strengthen the connective tissue between the 'Prometheus' and 'Alien' movies - with the classic Xenomorph alien set to scare a new generation of film goers, and featuring the return of the malevolent android David (Michael Fassbender).

'Alien: Covenant' will hit 3D and 2D cinemas on May 19 2017.

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Continue reading: 'Alien Covenant' releases first bloody trailer (full post)

RIP George Michael

Ben Gourlay | Celebrities & Entertainment | Dec 25, 2016 5:59 PM CST

In a year that's taken far too many icons of pop culture, BBC has confirmed that singer George Michael has today passed away at aged 53.

Michael rose to fame in the early 1980's as the lead singer of Wham!, before launching a successful solo career in 1987. In later years, the singer's personal life was marred by public disgrace and well publicised drug use. In a statement, Michaels publicist said "It is with great sadness that we can confirm our beloved son, brother and friend George passed away peacefully at home over the Christmas period."

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Tesla's Gigafactory looks busy in the newest footage

Lana Jelic | Electric Vehicles & Cars | Dec 25, 2016 1:36 PM CST

Tesla's Gigafactory is looking pretty amazing, as new drone footage shows. The footage was taken by Matthew Roberts and posted to YouTube.

The footage was recorded using a DJI Phantom 3 Professional and it shows views of the construction process in Ultra HD 4K.

It looks like Tesla is busy finishing what is going to be world's largest building by physical area once done.

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Continue reading: Tesla's Gigafactory looks busy in the newest footage (full post)

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