Latest News - Page 2434

Pokemon GO has been racking up some serious numbers on both Android and iOS, but now Apple has confirmed with Polygon that Pokemon GO broke iTunes records.

Niantic's massively popular game had more downloads in its first week than any other app in history according to Apple, with the company not providing any specifics on the amount of downloads. Considering Pokemon GO only launched earlier this month in the US and only hits Japan today, this is a huge deal.

As for revenue, estimates have Pokemon GO pulling in between $1 and $2.3 million per day - not bad for something that only launched in the last month. An analyst with App Annie told Inverse that the company could see $1 billion per year once the server issues are ironed out, and the game launches in more countries.

If you haven't already heard, the Intel Extreme Rig Challenge is here, which pits 12 custom PC manufacturers against each other on who can build the highest-end PC for $10,000. It's quite the task, and there are some big players involved.

AVADirect, ORIGIN, Maingear and others are in the mix, with our friends at AVADirect sitting in #4 position right now. The top 7 builders with the most Twitter votes will have their $10,000 gaming rigs on show at PAX West, and get this - they'll be raffled off to lucky winners on Twitter!

If you want to get into the draw, you can win AVADirect's gaming PC by hitting Twitter and tweeting "I vote @AVADirect in the #IntelRigChallenge" and bam, you're in the running to win one of the best gaming PCs you can build, period. Voting daily is even better, as it increases your odds of winning.

Right now it's all eyes and ears on Polaris and graphics cards with the Radeon RX 480, and the soon-to-be-released Radeon RX 470 and RX 460, but the upcoming Zen architecture is beginning to rear its head, and will rock CPU sockets in the very near future.

According to the latest leaks, engineering samples of the Zen CPU are around the place, with 4-, 8-, 24-, and 32-core variants in the wild. The first two SKUs will slot into the new AM4 socket, while the 24- and 32-core variants will be used in servers.

The quad-core Zen CPU has a 65W TDP, while the 8-core model rocks a 95W TDP - teasing the efficiency tweaks that AMD will deliver with Zen. The 24- and 32-core server SKUs ramp the TDP up to 150W and 180W, respectively. When it comes to tech specs, we should see the quad-core Zen CPU with 8 CPU threads 2MB of L2 cache and 8MB of L3 cache while the 8-core Zen CPU will rock 16 threads with double the cache.

AMD has had a great last 6 weeks or so, riding the Polaris wave with the launch of the Radeon RX 480 and now we're at the end of Q2 2016 - so we get some juicy financial reports to gloss over.

How did AMD go for the quarter? Well, they reported better-than-expected earnings and revenues for Q2 2016, and after the market closed, AMD reported an adjusted loss of 5c per share, lower than analysts' expectations of 8c per share. Revenues increased 9% year-over-year to reach $1.03 billion, beating analysts' expectations of $951.3 million.

AMD CEO Lisa Su said in a statement: "Based on the strength of our semi-custom products and demand for our latest Radeon RX GPUs and 7th Generation A-Series APUs, we are well positioned to drive growth and market share gains in the second half of the year".

For the first time ever, TweakTown is attending NerdHQ - which is a geek-a-thon that runs alongside Comic-Con and is powered by AMD and a bunch of other partners like Alienware and... Kelloggs, which were handing out... cereal, to gamers. Yeah, I'm not joking - and it was kind of cool.

Anyway, today I got some hands-on time with Battlefield 1 on the PC, which is something I've been itching for since DICE announced it not so long ago. I was playing on an Alienware Area 51 gaming PC that was powered by the AMD Radeon R9 Fury X, with a 2560x1440 monitor running at 144Hz. I was super critical on the resolution and detail settings of Battlefield 1, but DICE hid the graphics menu away from the public - so I don't know what setting it was running at.

From what I gathered, it was running at High settings because it looked gorgeous - and it ran buttery smooth on the Radeon R9 Fury X. Some of you might think "why wouldn't AMD run Battlefield 1 on the new Radeon RX 480", but the RX 480 is a mid-range graphics card, while the HBM1-based Radeon R9 Fury X is still a high-end/enthusiast level graphics card capable of handling 1440p at 144FPS in most games.

NVIDIA has just announced its new monster graphics card, the new Titan X. NVIDIA's new Titan X is based on the Pascal architecture, featuring a pretty damn good increase in specs over the already fast GeForce GTX 1080.

The new Titan X has 3584 CUDA cores compared to the 2560 CUDA cores on the GTX 1080, while we have 12GB of GDDR5X on a 384-bit memory bus, compared to the 256-bit memory bus on the GTX 1080. The new Titan X uses the GP102 which is based on the 16nm FinFET process, while GP104 powers the GTX 1080 and GTX 1070.

Power consumption wise, we're looking at a 250W TDP - up from the 180W on the GTX 1080, while we have 12 billion transistors on the new Titan X, compared to the 7.2 billion found on the GP104-based GTX 1080. The memory bandwidth has been increased thanks to the 384-bit memory bus, where we have a huge 480GB/sec - very close to the 512GB/sec offered by HBM1 on the AMD Radeon R9 Fury X.

To celebrate this week's release of Orphan Black: Season Four on Blu-ray and DVD, we have ten Blu-ray copies to give away thanks to our friends at Roadshow Home Entertainment.

Sarah has always lived the life of an orphan outsider. But a clone is never alone. Season 4 of the drama will see leader-of-the-pack, Sarah, reluctantly return home from her Icelandic hideout to track down an elusive and mysterious ally tied to the clone who started it all - Beth Childs. Sarah will follow Beth's footsteps into a dangerous relationship with a potent new enemy, heading in a horrifying new direction. Under constant pressure to protect the sisterhood and keep everyone safe, Sarah's old habits begin to resurface. As the close-knit sisters are pulled in disparate directions, Sarah finds herself estranged from the loving relationships that changed her for the better.

To go into the running to win a prize, simply answer the following question:

Facebook's first test flight for Aquila - the solar-powered plane that beams internet to remote regions -- was a success. Beginning on June 28 in Arizona, it went even better than expected: total flight time was about 288 minutes, much longer than the planned 96 minutes.

The plane -- developed by subsidiary company Ascenta in Bridgwater, Somerset - has the wingspan of a typical airline plane, but weighs less than a car, and consumes just 5,000 watts of energy.

"We're encouraged by this first successful flight, but we have a lot of work ahead of us," says Facebook head of engineering and infrastruture Jay Parikh. "In our next tests, we will fly Aquila faster, higher and longer, eventually taking it above 60,000 feet."

Nintendo has reconfirmed its March 2017 release for the next-gen NX console in its latest annual report, detailing the R&D activities for the future.

Nintendo talked about quite a lot, but it detailed its hardware development, where the Japanese gaming giant said that it's devoted to the development of Nintendo NX. Nintendo teases that NX will feature a "brand new concept" and will be released in March 2017.

During the annual report, Nintendo said: "With respect to hardware, Nintendo continuously investigates and undertakes research on fundamental technologies spanning data storage technology such as semiconductor memories, display technology such as liquid crystal displays, and electronic components, while it also carries out research and development activities to examine the applicability of various technologies including interfaces such as touch panels and sensors, wireless communication, networks and security to the field of home entertainment".

AMD impressed the world with its Radeon RX 480, priced at $199/$239 for its 4GB/8GB versions - and still coming out on top when it comes to performance for your dollar against NVIDIA's new GeForce GTX 1060. Well, the AIB partner cards are now rolling out with the devilish PowerColor Red Devil RX 480 8GB announced.

PowerColor has priced its new Red Devil RX 480 8GB at $269 in the US, with its GPU clocked at up to 1.33GHz and the 8GB of GDDR5 clocked at 2GHz. There's a single 8-pin PCIe power connector, with 6+1-phase power with each phase providing 25W of power compared to 22.5W on other boards.

PowerColor has deployed its latest fan technology dubbed Double Blase III, which "increases airflows and prevents dust deposition on the fans". Double Blase III is made with triple 80mm 2-ball bearing fans, and 2pcs of 8mm and another 2pcs of 6mm nickel-plated heat pipe for the best heat dissipation.

We've all been there: you drop your smartphone, your heart, soul and time itself stops for those 1-2 seconds as it hits the ground... but does it shatter? Sometimes yes, and sometimes no - depending on the smartphone itself, and whether it has Gorilla Glass protecting it.

Most high-end smartphones have Gorilla Glass, but now Corning is working on Gorilla Glass 5 - its best iteration yet. The Verge reports that Gorilla Glass 5 survives up to 80% of the time, when dropped from as high as 5.9 feet (1.8m), which is not too damn bad at all.

Until now, Gorilla Glass has protected smartphone screens from drops to flat and hard surfaces, but part of the development behind Gorilla Glass 5 is that it will protect your smartphone screen from sharp objects and rough surfaces. These surfaces might not necessarily shatter your screen, but they will damage the front of your phone - and this is what Corning hopes to stop with Gorilla Glass 5.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed the company's master plan in 2006, which was essentially to sell a low volume, expensive car, then a medium volume less expensive car, then a high volume affordable car, with each funding the one after it. 10 years later and with those lofty goals nearly accomplished, the time has come to pull the curtain on master plan part two, a key tenet of which includes your car making you money.

Self-driving safety in Tesla vehicles is largely determined by "fleet learning", the cumulative data derived from its self-driving vehicles and their experiences on the road. Turns out they're willing to pay you for that data: in the future, tapping a button on the Tesla app will add it to the "shared fleet", and you can set it to self-drive and provide data while you're at work or on vacation. The income is no paltry sum, either: Musk says it could potentially exceed the monthly loan or lease cost of the vehicle.

Further on the self-driving front, the vision is that once it's fully approved by regulators, you'll be able to 'summon' your Tesla from nearly anywhere (presumably with the app).

Following hot controversy behind CS:GO gambling, Valve has promised to shut these sites down. Now the company has issued several cease and desist letters to operators of known CS:GO and even Dota 2 skin gambling sites.

Here's Valve's cease and desist order in full: "We are aware that you are operating one of the gambling sites listed below. You are using Steam accounts to doncut this business. Your use of Steam is subject to the terms of the Steam Subscriber Agreement (SSA). Under the SSA Steam and Steam services are licensed for personal and non-commercial use only.

"Your commercial use of Steam accounts is unlicensed and is in violation of the SSA. You should immediately cease and desist further use of your Steam accounts for any commercial purpose. If you fail to do this within ten (10) days, Valve will pursue all available remedies, including without limitation, terminating your accounts."

The anticipated System Shock remake will be making the jump to consoles and PC, Nightdive Studios has just announced.

After successfully Kickstarting its System Shock remake, Nightdive has decided to bring the game to PS4 and Xbox One too. "After a few weeks and lotttts of emails, we are officially on track for bringing System Shock to the PS4 (and Xbox One)! No stretch goal for it. We're adding it in as a thank you to our backers that put their faith in us," said System Shock Project Director Jason Fader.

The studio announced the news in a new PlayStation Blog post, and the Kickstarter page was updated to list the Xbox One platform as well. Nightdive's Jason Fader further revealed the studio is bringing in tons of AAA talent, affirming that the System Shock remake would have the signature elements of the beloved PC original as well as new touches from Fallout New: Vegas and Planetside devs.

Mere weeks away from No Man's Sky launch, Hello Games finds itself embroiled in yet another hurdle; the studio has faced data-destroying floods, a legal battle with SkyTV's trademarking of the world "Sky", and now a potential patent infringement case that could delay the game even further.

Dutch company Genicap claims that No Man's Sky unlawfully uses the company's patented Gielis Superformula technology to build its near-infinite, procedurally-generated universe. Genicap goes on to say that Hello Games hasn't properly licensed the use of their Superformula, and will need to do so before the game launches. "We haven't provided a license to Hello Games," said Genicap's Jeroen Sparrow from the company. "We don't want to stop the launch, but if the formula is used we'll need to have a talk."

Although Genicap hasn't seen No Man's Sky's code and doesn't know how explicit the so-called "infringement" really is, Sean Murray admitted to building the initial foundations of No Man's Sky using the Gielis Superformula. The Superformula is integral to No Man's Sky's procedurally-generated world and serves as the core for the game itself, and Genicap is alleging the studio isn't licensed to use their mathematical code. According to the New Yorker, the Gielis Superformula was created in 2003 by Belgian plant geneticist Johan Gielis. After developing the formula, Professor Johan Gielis took his findings to Genicap, and is still a member of the company.

EA is continuing its free Battlefield 4 DLC spree with Naval Strike, now available for the low price of zero dollars on Origin (for a limited time).

Naval Strike launched in 2014 and features four sea-based maps with a focus on -- you guessed it -- naval gameplay. Although there is still plenty of infantry and air vehicle action, there's also a lot of time to be spent in sea vehicles, many equipped with powerful guns and rockets, and one that can be driven on land or sea.

The DLC also features a cool Carrier Assault mode, which serves as an homage to Battlefield 2142's Titan Mode. Although generally regarded to be less well-received than its inspiration, it still offers a fun twist on the usual formulas. Last I checked, it hadn't really caught on, but it's plausible the 'free' thing will change that.

The High Court of Paris has ruled Google and Bing are not required to filter torrent-related searches within their respective engines. The request to implement such functionality as well as block websites with the word torrent in their name was put forth by local music industry organization Syndicat national de l'édition phonographique (SNEP).

SNEP's argument -- based upon its country's intellectual property code which states "all appropriate measures" are allowed in preventing copyright infringement -- was that torrent searches linked largely to illegal content. It's not an outrageous argument to make as pirate websites have disappeared before under the aforementioned code. In this case, however the court decided such measures were not appropriate, thanks in part to Microsoft's argument that such a filtering system would be , as TorrentFreak describes it, "imprecise, disproportionate and inefficient" (thus punishing legal websites).

The High Court decided such measures were not appropriate as the filtering system would be, as TorrentFreak describes it, "imprecise, disproportionate, and inefficient," thus punishing legal websites and their users, as well as anyone utilizing the Bittorrent protocol legally.

With the release of Watch Dogs 2 right around the corner, Ubisoft is going into overdrive with its marketing campaign, or is it?

During Ubisoft's recent Q1 2016 earnings result, company CEO Yves Guillemot said that Watch Dogs was Ubisoft's best-selling IP launch of 2014, selling over 10 million copies in total. According to Ubisoft's own surveys, 85% of Watch Dogs players are interested in Watch Dogs 2.

The Watch Dogs 2 trailer has accumulated over 30 million views, which has Ubisoft leading to believe that it will be one of the best-selling games the company has ever made. When pressed about the number of sales that Ubisoft expects from Watch Dogs 2, they said they expect it to sell as many as the first one did.

We all know just impossibly huge Pokemon GO has been, but with Nintendo struggling against Microsoft and Sony in the console war, Pokemon GO has helped Nintendo surpass Sony in the stock market.

Nintendo is now worth more than Sony, and that is thanks to Pokemon GO. Don't believe me? Look at the chart above, and you'll see the insane spike in Nintendo's market cap since Pokemon GO launched earlier this month. Nintendo's stock has increased by close to $20 billion, a near 100% increase from what it was before Pokemon GO launched.

The numbers are absolutely off the charts, and I'm sure Nintendo is celebrating like crazy right now. It could probably give everyone who plays Pokemon GO a free next-gen Nintendo NX console when it launches and not even feel the pinch on their credit card, and it's all thanks to Pokemon GO - which is a free game. Insanity.

The US government requested a new record of user data from Google in the second half of 2016, with 40,677 requests impacting as many as 81,311 user accounts, reports ZDNet.

From July through to December 2015, the US government requested the 40.677 requests, an 18% increase from the first half of the year. Most of the requests are coming from the US, with 12,523 data requests in the three-month period, with requests impacting 27,157 users or accounts.

Google says it has been reporting the number of user data requests in a 6-month period going back to the second half of 2009, while it has been detailing the users and accounts it has impacted in the first half of 2011. Google notes: "Usage of our services have increased every year, and so have the user data request numbers".