Latest News - Page 2354

If you were bored with your weekend and wanted to see something maybe a little unexpected, then you'll be glad to know we have the official trailer for the upcoming Power Rangers movie to cheer you up.

As you can see, it looks like a Transformers-like movie with a massive injection of teenage drama and angst... but director Dean Israelite explains his ideas behind Lionsgate's adaption of the TV series: "I grew up on Power Rangers in South Africa and what was important to me from the beginning was making a movie about growing up".

He continued: "I wanted to make this a grounded, character driven origin story that was always set to the backdrop of this adventure. Always at the center was making these characters real with real problems that people can find relatable. I wanted to remain true to the spirit of the franchise that I grew up on and loved. And I wanted really hard to reimagine it and reinvent it for a 2017 audience".

Intel will soon introduce their next-generation CPU architecture, and now we know that 100-series motherboards from ASUS will support the upcoming Kaby Lake processors - while the impending release of the 200 series will support them from day one.

ASUS series100 motherboards can be updated with Kaby Lake support through a BIOS update, using either a USB drive in the UEFI, or within Windows. You can get the new BIOS update on the ASUS website.

Here's a list of the ASUS 100-series motherboards that will support Kaby Lake CPUs after the BIOS update:

Overwatch is one of the most addictive first-person shooters ever, and now Blizzard are set to inject a little more of that addiction into the game through a new character, and a purported new Halloween brawl. A post on the Overwatch subreddit said that the leak originated from a "Russian OW group".

Sombra is the new character ready for Overwatch, and it looks like she isn't just part of Blizzard's alternate reality game that's still going on. Images have been plastered all over the internet in popular places like Reddit, Imgur, Gyazo and more, showing Sombra as "one of the world's best and most notorious hackers". The image seems to be from an internal Blizzard site, so we don't know when and where the photo was taken.

The partial description of Sombra teased that she worked with the Mexican Los Muertos gang, as saw saw in Solider: 76's animated short, but her collaboration with the gang was short-lived "until she attracted too much unwanted attention and had to go underground".

Google really did make quite the impression when it announced its new Pixel smartphones, a first for the company in premium all-Google smartphones with some nice surprises like the near-perfect voice assistant in Google Assistant - oh, and Google claiming Pixel has the best smartphone camera ever.

Well, you're not going to push all of those points along with the fact that Pixel and Pixel XL ship with Android 7.1, with Google putting a massive load of optimizations and tweaks to the Android operating system. Because Google isn't a known manufacturer of hardware products, the company wants to make a splash. Rachel Pasqua from a New York-based advertising firm said: "This is the first time they are in the position of selling themselves to people, as opposed to selling themselves to brands".

Mario Queiroz, Vice President of Product Management for Google said that the company was about to start its major advertising power on Pixel, we didn't get an exact dollar amount. We were teased that Google would be buying ads during Thanksgiving football games, which we all know are very lucrative - thus, very expensive.

Google has already sold out of its new Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones, with the larger 128GB models of both handsets selling out quickly, followed by the 32GB version.

The Google Store ran out of the 128GB models first, most likely because there's no 64GB option - so people like myself will jump to the larger version, as we have a lack of expandable storage. Google is selling its first premium smartphones in two sizes: 5-inch and 5.5-inch with the Pixel, and Pixel XL respectively.

Pixel pricing:

During the last nearly 16 years, the International Space Station has been a home for many astronauts and cosmonauts. Currently, there are six people aboard the ISS and, like many before them, spend around nine and a half hours a day doing different research. If we exclude the time they spend sleeping, members of the crew have around four hours a day of free time during which they eat, but also entertain themselves.

To maximize the use of their free time, many find interesting ways of entertainment.

One of the most interesting things you can do aboard the Space Station is to "fly". In space there are no terms 'up' and 'down', there is no floor or ceiling.

Gears of War 4: Ultimate Edition is now available for the Xbox One and Window 10-powered PCs. The latest edition has been making headlines with its advanced admission, granting gamers early access to the game, with a full 4 days of game play prior to the official launch on October 11, meaning that unless you have purchased the Ultimate Edition pack you will have to, unfortunately bide your time and wait it out till the 11th.

The early access edition contains loads of perks, including a season pass that is worth $50. The pass features a Vintage VIP Pack, entry to a developer playlist for multiplayer, and permanent access to 24 DLC maps. The Ultimate Edition will also offer users a 17-pack Starter Airdrop feature that unlocks characters, weapon skins, emblems, equipment, boosts for Horde and Versus multiplayer modes in addition to three bounty cards.

Gears of War 4 featured as an 'Xbox Play Anywhere' title, which lets buyers of the digital copy for Xbox One or PC, be granted early access to the other versions free of charge. This provides Microsoft players with the option to save their progress between platforms, letting them go from Xbox to PC and vice versa without losing any of their game data.

It seems to be common these days for smartphones to blow up, and it's not just limited to the Samsung Galaxy Note 7, with an iPhone 6 Plus owner in Fresno, California having her iPhone 6 Plus blow up next to her... while she slept.

Yvette Estrada was sleeping when she heard a flash and then flames leaping from her bed, coming from her iPhone 6 Plus which was on charge. She explained: "I heard a sizzling, then we heard the pop and the whole fire was coming out of the screen", adding that her husband put the fire out by throwing the phone into a sink, adding: "He put water on it and told me to call 911".

The fire and heat from the iPhone 6 Plus got so hot that it damaged the nearby dresser, a pair of glasses, and two Apple Watch stands.

Tech companies earn lots of money, that's no news. The value of these companies exceeds even the largest oil giants. Earlier this year, Apple announced their last quarter's profit - $18.4 billion, which is the highest amount for a public company ever.

To help us mortals understand these large amounts, Penny Stocks Lab made a great visualization showing how much companies like Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Facebook and many others, earn per second.

Together all the listed companies earn around $2360 a second, or around $141.600 per minute. The largest piece of the cake, about 50%, goes to Apple.

As reported yesterday, Mafia III has launched with a 30 FPS cap on PC, but a fix is on the way. Turns out you won't have long to wait at all, according to a statement released by developer Hangar 13.

"We currently have a patch running here at the studio that includes 30, 60, and unlimited frames-per-second options in the video menu, among other improvements for the PC version of Mafia III," it says. "We're verifying the patch now to ensure everything is working as expected. If everything goes well, we expect the update to go live this weekend. We will be keeping the PC community up-to-date on the status of the patch throughout the weekend and thank you for all the feedback!"

While launching with a mandatory 30 FPS cap is less than desirable, the quick turnaround is nice to see and should mean the debacle is all but forgotten before long.

Google recent sent out an e-mail to its Mobile Services partners indicating Hangouts will no longer be required to be bundled with hardware. Rather, video calling app Duo will take its place.

"Duo will replace Hangouts within the suite of core GMS apps, and Hangouts will become GMS Optional for telephony products," it reads. "This change will take effect on December 1, 2016."

What's also interesting is Google's text messaging app Allo isn't getting the nod alongside Duo; for whatever reason, the company is content to not push the text side of their new communication apps in this regard, at least for the time being.

Every day, more than 100 million people use Facebook events, so it made perfect sense for Facebook to introduce it as a standalone app.

Facebook events app is perfect for users who like to have a better overview of the upcoming events, but Facebook doesn't require you to download the app to be able to use Events in your Facebook app, at least not for now.

When you open Events, you can see the events your Facebook friends are interested in, recently-announced events by the pages you like, and updates from events you're already connected to. You can also browse the events based on your interests or location. Events app features an interactive map that will help you browse trough the events easier, something that the Events feature in Facebook's main app doesn't have.

The Belgian Big Brother Awards 2016 yesterday unanimously granted the title of 'ultimate privacy villain of the year' to Facebook, as decided by the public and a professional jury.

"We nominated Facebook for the award because their default settings are noxious for privacy," explained Joe McNamee, Executive Director of European Digital Rights. He later remarked, "Facebook is a multi-billion dollar company that has one commodity - you!"

Digital rights and freedoms association EDRi describes Facebook as having "access to a wide range of personal data, and it tracks your movements across the web, whether you are logged in or not."

The Kickstarter gadget iBand+ wants to help you lucid dream as well as sleep easier and better. A three-part solution, it requires a headband, pillow speakers, and an app, all of which combine to monitor your mind and body.

Once you hit REM sleep, audio-visual cues play which make you aware you're dreaming without waking you up, which should result in better sleep. Additionally, music plays during different stages of sleep to help you achieve more satisfying rest, each carefully chosen for the given stage.

Finally, the app offers "a glimpse into [your] physical and mental state that could disclose potential health and sleep problems."

NASA has set a date for their next International Space Station crew launch - October 19th. The initial launch was planned for September 23rd, but because of technical difficulties with the Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft it was postponed.

A statement from Roscosmos, the governmental body responsible for the space science program of Russia and general aerospace research, explains the cause of the delay and determines that the spacecraft is now ready for the launch:

This week at Oculus Connect 3, NVIDIA announced that VR Funhouse, an extremely fun virtual reality game, will support Oculus Touch. There are also two new levels coming to the VR Funhouse - HotShot Basketball and Wall Walker Toss.

More than 100,000 gamers have downloaded VR Funhouse since its release in July, and now, with the support for Oculus Touch, more developers and gamers can join in the fun.

I tried VR Funhouse at this year's Computex in Taiwan, using the HTC Vive, and loved it. You get to bounce around between mini games, like archery and Whack A Gnome, in a virtual carnival. It reminded me of the Darkmoon Faire in World of Warcraft. Of course, emerging into virtual reality is a totally different experience, and after testing many games in VR, I have to say that VR Funhouse is one of the most addictive games I tried.

The latest electric bicycle coming from Greyp Bikes, whose founder is Mate Rimac, the CEO and founder of Rimac Automobili, will be able to go up to 240 km on one charge. Not surprising considering it has a massive 3kWh battery.

Greyp's current model, the G12S, has a shorter range but it can go faster at 70 km/h. The new model, the G12H will have a maximum speed of 45 km/h.

According to the company, the G12H will have noticeably longer range than anything you can find on the market.

Elon Musk has a plan to colonize Mars, but he isn't the only one who wants to get to the Red Planet. Speaking at a conference in Chicago, Dennis Muilenburg, the CEO of The Boeing Company, stated that he is convinced that the first humans to set foot on Mars will get there by a Boeing rocket.

The Boeing Company is involved in space exploration practically since the founding of NASA. They built the first stage of the Saturn V rocket, the three-stage liquid-fueled launch vehicle developed to support the Apollo program for human exploration of the Moon, and was later used to launch Skylab, the first American space station. Boeing also participated with other projects in the space program, and was the first contractor for the International Space Station program.

NASA has awarded contracts to Boeing and SpaceX for transporting astronauts to the International Space Station, and seems like their rivalry will continue since Boeing, like SpaceX, is also working on the design and development of a new rocket that should bring the first people to Mars.

The Order: 1886 was one of the better-looking games on the PS4, even with its extreme letterboxing use to mask the underperforming PS4 hardware. Well, Ready at Dawn has announced their latest game, a VR-focused title exclusive to Oculus, and made for the upcoming Oculus Touch controllers.

Lone Echo features a highly-interactive single player story, but also combines this with an online competitive virtual sport, all set in a beautiful, highly-detailed 23rd-century world.

Ready at Dawn has prepared quite the experience with the Touch-powered game, where you can grab, push, and glide your way through the first-person 360-degree science fiction experience. Not only can you reach out and touch interactive elements of the environment, but you can fly towards them with 1:1 hand-based zero-gravity movement.

NVIDIA has a new driver for GeForce graphics card owners who want to get the very best from the latest game releases in Gears of War 4, Mafia 3, and even Shadow Warrior 2. You can grab the new GeForce 373.06 WHQL drivers right here.

The new GeForce 373.06 WHQL drivers include optimizations for those games, as well as SLI profiles for Battlefield 1 and Iron Storm. Updated 3D Vision profiles have been provided, with Ashes of Singularity now rated as 'excellent', while Gears of War 4 is 'fair' and both Mafia III and Shadow Warrior 2 are 'not recommended' right now.

There are some software module revision changes, and Windows 10 issues that have been fixed - with improvements made to the "framerate consistency of the R370 drivers in VR games and applications", and "corruption in Overwatch decals" has been fixed. The full changelog: