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We've came a long way: The growth in phone resolutions
Many of us have used one of Nokia's phones at one point in our lives. The Nokia 3310 is still mentioned as an indestructible phone with amazing battery life. The popularity of Nokia phones is best shown in the sales numbers - both the Nokia 5110 and Nokia 3210 have been sold more than 160 million units.
Compared with today's luxury smartphones, these old models look very modest. Especially if we compare the size of the screen and its resolution. In less than two decades, we have witnessed major changes in the dimensions and quality.
Apple's iPhone 7 Plus has a 514 times higher screen resolution than the Nokia 5110, which was launched in 1998.
Continue reading: We've came a long way: The growth in phone resolutions (full post)
This map shows cyber attacks in real-time
Tens of thousands of cyber attacks occur every second, but it's hard to imagine and visualize the number of attacks. Norse, a company from California that provides intelligence to many different companies, has created an interactive map where users can watch the cyber attacks in real-time.
The attacks are shown with colored lines that connect the source and the target of the attack. Norse tracks these attacks with the help of more than 8 million sensors located in 47 different countries.
The map looks really impressive, but also worrisome considering how much of our personal information and financial records are stored online.
Continue reading: This map shows cyber attacks in real-time (full post)
New Pixel phones feature 'Google Magic,' comes in blue
It's just hours before Google's big new Pixel and Pixel XL smartphone reveal, and we've received even more fresh leaks on the potent handset duo.
Thanks to recent leaks, Google's new Pixel and Pixel XL smartphone announcements have been spoiled and we already know most of the important info, including the duo's beefy specs--4GB of onboard RAM, Snapdragon 821 processors, roomy storage, etc. But Google still has some surprises up their sleeves, and they could be, well, magical.
A new bit of info from a now-pulled Verizon listing mentions something called "Google Magic," which could refer to Pixel-exclusive software or unique gesture-tracking features. Google is expected to unveil its new Daydream mobile VR headset at today's reveal event, so I'm thinking "Google Magic" has something to do with Daydream.
Continue reading: New Pixel phones feature 'Google Magic,' comes in blue (full post)
Facebook launches Messenger Lite, app for feature phones
Facebook has announced a "lite" version of its Messenger app - Messenger Lite. The app is designed for older phones that run on slower internet connections.
Messenger Lite will initially launch in Kenya, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Tunisia and Venezuela, but it will come to other countries as well. The app will have basic Messenger features like sending messages, photos and stickers but compared to the official Messenger app some features will be left out.
The app will be available for Android devices and there is no information if a version of Messenger Lite will be launched for iOS.
Continue reading: Facebook launches Messenger Lite, app for feature phones (full post)
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided now has HDR support on consoles
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided launched back in August without a huge impression left on gamers, but now the console versions of the game have been updated with support for HDR.
HDR support for Deus Ex: Mankind Divided has reached the Xbox One S, PS4 and the upcoming PS4 Pro. The full patch notes:
The following features have been added:
Continue reading: Deus Ex: Mankind Divided now has HDR support on consoles (full post)
PSVR headset needs to be unplugged to use PS4 in HDR
Sony is set to launch its new PlayStation VR headset in just 10 days time, while its faster and more capable PS4 Pro goes on sale in around a month from now. Before that, we're finding more details out on the upcoming PSVR headset, and it kinda sucks.
The upcoming PS4 Pro will be capable of HDR, which is a big deal for Sony's refreshed console, but if you've got your PSVR headset plugged into your console, you'll need to unplug it for your HDR-capable TV to work. This is because the PSVR headset hooks up to the PS4 through an external box called the Processor Unit, which acts as an HDMI splitter. This allows the PS4 to output images to a second screen, like your TV - and it also handles the audio processing for 3D sound.
This means the PSVR headset is hooked up to the PS4 through USB, connecting to the Processor Unit with a hybrid HDMI and auxiliary cable, and then that box connects to the PS4 and TV with separate HDMI cables. Blurgh. The big issue here is that Sony has confirmed the Processor Box's passthrough functionality does not support HDR, at all. If you want to play HDR content from your new PS4 Pro console, you'll need to unplug the Processor Unit, and thus your PSVR headset, completely.
Continue reading: PSVR headset needs to be unplugged to use PS4 in HDR (full post)
PC version of Gears of War 4 can now be pre-loaded
Gears of War 4 is nearly upon us, with The Coalition unleashing the pre-loading of the PC version of the game. The developer is urging gamers to update their Windows 10 installations before pre-loading the game.
Remember that you'll require a monster amount of HDD space to install Gears of War 4, with a 73.3GB download for the game. The new update for Windows 10 that you'll require is the KB3194496 update, released yesterday - and if you don't have the update, you should be restricted from downloading Gears of War 4 - at least until you update Windows 10.
Gears of War 4 launches on October 11 for both the Xbox One and Windows 10-powered PCs, with the Ultimate Edition dropping a few days earlier on October 7.
Continue reading: PC version of Gears of War 4 can now be pre-loaded (full post)
Hyperloop teased Down Under, could connect Australians
Australia is a great country, but the states, cities, and towns aren't connected well enough - but this could all change with the introduction of Hyperloop, from Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk. Rob Lloyd, former Cisco boss, now runs Hyperloop One, with engineers from companies like NASA and Boeing, with them working on "passive magnetic levitation technology".
Hyperloop One is an LA-based company that secured $80 million earlier this year, publicly teasing its propulsion system, the closest yet that we've been to Musk's vision of transportation for the future. Hyperloop One's VP for Worldwide Business Development, Alan James, talked with The Australian, where he said: "We're very keen to explore the potential for doing proof of operations in Australia and the reason for that is there's a clear long-term need for ultra-fast transport on the Australian east coast".
Hyperloop has been teased at taking passengers across distances that would otherwise take hours upon hours, at speeds of up to 621mph (1000kmph), all in freight pods that zoom across large distances in low-pressure tubes. James continued: "Melbourne to Sydney is the third busiest air corridor in the world and we can give you Melbourne downtown to Sydney downtown in 55 minutes. So we would be looking, either in NSW or Victoria, or possibly in ACT, to develop the first section of that route, to prove the operation of Hyperloop, to get regulatory approval".
Continue reading: Hyperloop teased Down Under, could connect Australians (full post)
Nintendo NX rumored to be 3-4x faster than Wii U
We were the first source in the world to announce that NVIDIA's unannounced Pascal-based Tegra would power Nintendo's next-gen NX console, and it seems more and more outlets are confirming this news - including the latest leak on NX.
According to Direct Feed Gaming, Nintendo NX will be 3-4x more powerful than the Wii U (in raw Gigaflops numbers), adding that game developers won't have too much trouble porting over their Xbox One and PS4 games to NX. Nintendo's new NX console will support Unreal Engine 4 and other mainstream gamer engines, making game ports much easier.
Nintendo will most likely skip on 4K and HDR support for NX, and that the "hybrid" side of the console might be interesting, but all of the other crazy rumors are supposedly just that, rumors.
Continue reading: Nintendo NX rumored to be 3-4x faster than Wii U (full post)
Quantum Break performs worse in DX12 than DX11 on PC
Remedy has not had a good experience with the PC version of Quantum Break, and now that the Steam version has been released, people are testing the game on both DX11 and DX12. It seems that DX11 is performing better than DX12, and we shouldn't be surprised.
Eurogamer has a detailed report on Quantum Break performing better on DX11, running a GeForce GTX 970 and seeing an increase from 33FPS on DX12 to 44.7FPS on DX11. On the newer GeForce GTX 1060, the performance jumps from 39.5FPS on DX12, to 47.5FPS on DX11. It's far away from 60FPS, but details can be adjusted on DX11 on a mid-range card like the GTX 1060, and still hit 60FPS.
As for the DX12 performance, we should expect that as Microsoft and nearly every developer releasing DX12-capable games seems to have dropped the ball. Some games are scraping through, but games like Quantum Break are massive AAA titles that should have performance completely locked down on APIs like DX12, instead we're met with a myriad of issues on the Windows Store version of the game, and now gimped performance on DX12.
Continue reading: Quantum Break performs worse in DX12 than DX11 on PC (full post)
Hello Games priced No Man's Sky at $60, not Sony
Hello Games set its own price for No Man's Sky on PS4 and PC--Sony and other business partners had nothing to do with it.
For the longest time, I thought that No Man's Sky's $60 price tag was a result of some business decision between Hello Games and its distributors, including Sony and iam8bit. But that doesn't make a lot of sense considering No Man's Sky is $60 on Steam and GoG, too.
Still, I thought it wasn't as simple as Hello Games arbitrarily deciding to charge that much for their indie game--it just didn't seen possible for them to be that greedy. I mean who in their right mind would put the highest possible pricetag on a product that barely resembles the game you spent years hyping?
Continue reading: Hello Games priced No Man's Sky at $60, not Sony (full post)
France's new bank cards feature ever-changing digits
French digital security company Oberthur Technologies has developed a revolutionary new bank card that should make it very difficult for fraudsters to do any damage to your account. Called Motion Code, the technology sees that three digit PIN on the back of your card change every hour for three years, meaning anyone who steals your card or acquires the digits will have minimal time to spend your money.
Most fraud occurs hours or days after cards are stolen, but no doubt the criminals will catch on and spend the money quicker upon recognizing a Motion Code card.
The downside is added difficulty in using your card remotely: no longer will you be able to memorize the PIN and use it regardless of whether you have your card on you or not. But for most, it's likely well worth it.
Continue reading: France's new bank cards feature ever-changing digits (full post)
Sean Murray might explain No Man's Sky lies soon
Despite all the lies, gamers might finally have an honest resolution from No Man's Sky developer Sean Murray.
On his new YouTube Gaming LIVE showcase, games personality Geoff Keighely delivered an inside perspective on No Man's Sky. Keighley says that Sean Murray is "open" to coming on the show to discuss the game and what went wrong, and why he lied--it'd be like a sort of confessional, so to speak.
Since No Man's Sky's backlash launch, Sean Murray has basically quit the internet: he hasn't tweeted anything for over a month, and has yet to actually address the lies and deception. In fact, Hello Games is currently being investigated by the UK's Advertisement Standards Agency for misleading advertising.
Continue reading: Sean Murray might explain No Man's Sky lies soon (full post)
How to make SNES controller into plug-and-play emulator
Have you ever wanted to make your own portable emulator arcade out of an SNES controller? Well, now you can.
DIY tech modder Anthony Caccese has created a DIY on how to stuff a Raspberry Pi Zero into an Super Nintendo controller, effectively letting you make your own all-in-one emulator and controller solution. The SNS-005 can be easily plugged into a TV via an HDMI cord, and is powered by its own 3.7v 500mAh internal battery that last about 2.5 hours, and can be charged up at any point via Micro USB.
This project is for all aspiring DIY tecchies out there who've always wanted to tinker with a Raspberry Pi and make something awesome. I have to say that this invention is pretty nifty, especially since mini emulator arcades are typically small handhelds or tiny set-top boxes you connect controllers to, so it's really neat to see an all-in-one solution made out of a controller.
Continue reading: How to make SNES controller into plug-and-play emulator (full post)
Resident Evil 7 might come to Vive, Oculus Rift in 2018
Resident Evil VII isn't actually fully exclusive on Sony's PlayStation VR: Capcom's deal with Sony is timed exclusive, so the horror game could come to other VR headsets in the future. But there's one catch: we'll have to wait a full year.
Capcom's new Resident Evil VII is touted as the first "full VR experience" on Sony's new PlayStation VR, meaning you'll be able to play the entire base game in VR. Normally VR games are "smaller, passive experiences" that focus on quality versus game time, and PSVR's games are no exception (Batman Arkham VR only lasts 2.5 hours on PSVR) . So a full-scaled VR game is a great selling point for the PSVR, regardless how sick it'll make you.
But it looks like Resident Evil VII's exclusivity lease is up in 2018, and it could jump to other VR headsets like the Oculus Rift and Vive at that time. The key word here is could, and it all depends on whether Capcom thinks there's a market for it or not.
Continue reading: Resident Evil 7 might come to Vive, Oculus Rift in 2018 (full post)
PS4 Pro can hit native 4K 60FPS, has hidden secret sauce
The devs at Voofoo were able to use Sony's new PlayStation 4 Pro console to hit native 4K 60FPS in their new indie-style racing game Mantis Burn, and Digital Foundry thinks there's more to meets the eye with the PS4 Pro.
Remember when PS4 architect Mark Cerny said the PS4 Pro uses "many new features from AMD's Polaris architecture as well as several even beyond it"? Now it looks like some devs are tapping the console's "beyond Polaris" tech in order to achieve some impressive performance. Eurogamer's Digital Foundry recently tried out Mantis Burn, a Micro-Machines-type racing game that's the first to hit native 4K 60FPS on the PS4 Pro.
While Mantis Burn isn't a huge AAA endeavor, Digital Foundry was still surprised that the devs could hit native 4K with forward rendering and hit a consistent 60FPS in the game, leading them to conclude the PS4 Pro has some "secret sauce" that we don't know about yet:
Continue reading: PS4 Pro can hit native 4K 60FPS, has hidden secret sauce (full post)
ASRock's next-gen Z270 Gaming K6 teased
Intel's next-gen Kaby Lake architecture is around the corner, with a tease of the Core i7-7700K processor and it packing a massive 40% improvement over the Skylake architecture in single-threaded performance - but now, we're seeing Z270-based motherboards from ASRock teased.
The two motherboards from ASRock are in the Z270 Gaming K6 and Z270 Pro 4, with the Gaming K6 featuring a red and black theme, and will be aimed at the - uh, hmm - gaming market.
ASRock will most likely aim its Z270 Pro 4 at the mainstream market, and as for when we'll see the new Z270-based boards from ASRock, we should be aiming for CES 2017.
Continue reading: ASRock's next-gen Z270 Gaming K6 teased (full post)
Batman Arkham VR's story is only 1 hour long
Rocksteady confirms that their upcoming Batman VR game for Sony's PlayStation VR headset will only take about 2.5 hours to beat completely, with the main story lasting only an hour long.
"The core narrative is about 60 minutes in duration, however additional content is unlocked that provides about another 90 minutes of gameplay on top of that. So there are plenty of reasons to play through the game multiple times in order to see everything that we have put into it," Rocksteady Studios Brand Marketing Producer Dax Ginn told Press Start.
I already knew what to expect from most PlayStation VR games, especially since Sony has confirmed that most PSVR games will be "simple passive experiences". But if you're excited about the PlayStation VR, you need to understand that most of these games will not be full experiences (with the exception of Resident Evil VII), and there's a good reason for that.
Continue reading: Batman Arkham VR's story is only 1 hour long (full post)
This iOS feature could cost you a lot: Turn it off now
The Wi-Fi Assist feature on iOS was introduced last year in iOS 9, and Apple is sticking with it. This feature is designed to prevent the use of a poor Wi-Fi connection but it could cause you a headache and a larger phone bill, especially for those who don't have unlimited data traffic.
Both iOS 9 and iOS 10 have this feature enabled by default and it is set to automatically switch to the mobile internet when your Wi-Fi is weak.
This can be useful for maintaining a good internet connection when, for example, leaving the house, but if you do not have unlimited data traffic, this could affect your phone bill.
Continue reading: This iOS feature could cost you a lot: Turn it off now (full post)
5Gbps Ethernet on the way, will use your old cables
Over the last couple of weeks I've been complaining that my 1Gbps network connection to my NAS was too slow, as I was only transferring to and from my Thecus and QNAP NAS at 100MB/sec - well, 5Gbps networking is on the way, promising 500MB/sec.
The new 5Gbps Ethernet standard has been finalized, with IEEE 802.3bz ready for the job - soon, at least. We've been sitting at a wall for a while now on gigabit ethernet, because 10GbE requires much more expensive cables in the form of fiber optic, or more expensive Cat6a or Cat7 cabling. It's not backwards compatible with previous standards, as well as routers, switches, and network cards for 10GbE networking being much more expensive than the normal GbE products.
This is where the new 2.5GBASE-T and 5GBASE-T standards step up, both "specifically created to use 10GbE signaling, but at a rate that would be compatible with existing runs of Cat5e and Cat6 cable out to 100 meters. The 2.5Gbps standard can run on Cat5e out to 100 meters, while the 5Gbps standard requires Cat6 cable to run 100 meters. Both should be far easier - and cheaper - to bring to market than current 10GbE technologies", reports ExtremeTech.
Continue reading: 5Gbps Ethernet on the way, will use your old cables (full post)








