Latest News - Page 2576

Seagate is on quite the roll lately with the introduction of an 8TB NAS focused consumer HDD, which is a first in the industry. This HDD uses six platters with 1.33TB per platter, making it incredibly dense. It'll be shipping this later on in this quarter for $385.

Though it's being marketed towards everyone, it's really designed for the NAS and RAID applications, which likely entail a much more constant workload. Each of the six 1.33TB large platters use perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) technology that's been well refined since commercial introduction in 2005.

The drive operates at 7200RPM with 256MB of DRAM cache and a SATA 3 interface. The dense platters and even the normal spindle speed should allow a peak transfer rate from the media to the internal cache of about 216MB/s, which is quite impressive for a mechanical device. This new NAS HDD joins Seagate's other SMB and consumer NAS drives that can be found in 4-6TB's of storage space.

After nearly twenty years of shaping the video games industry, key Rockstar Games executive Leslie Benzies has left the company.

As boss of Rockstar North, Leslie Benzies helped create some of the most iconic games of our era, including AAA juggernauts like the Grand Theft Auto series and the ultra-popular Western action-adventure Red Dead Redemption. Now Rockstar has confirmed that Benzies has officially left the studio after 17 years of rocking the gaming world.

"We can confirm that Leslie Benzies went on sabbatical on September 1, 2014 and has decided not to return to work for the company," Rockstar said in a statement to Kotaku. "We are very grateful for Leslie's contributions to Rockstar over the last 15 years as we worked together to make some amazing games.Leslie helped us build an incredible team that will continue to create great experiences for our fans. Leslie will always be a friend to the company and of course we are going to miss him but we wish him the absolute best for the future."

Sony just pushed out a new firmware update for the PS4 that brings it to version 3.15. The new update doesn't actually add anything new, however.

In the patch notes there's only one line that very simply states that it "improve the quality of the system performance," meaning they generically streamlined something to make it more stable, but what and why is unknown. As we download it ourselves we'll take a look at if anything actually improves.

I don't quite remember it having too many issues before with the last update, though just to be on the safe side, why not update to the latest. It should be done automatically for most, though you can always manually update within the PS4 itself, or head over to the website and update via a USB drive as well.

In a bid to challenge Steam's long-standing reign, EA has introduced its acclaimed all-you-can-play games service to the PC market.

The PC flavor of EA Access is called Origin Access, and comes with the same benefits as the Xbox One service: unlimited access to a smattering of games in the EA Vault, exclusive trials and beta tests to upcoming EA games, and 10% off purchases on Origin.While the two services look quite similar, the PC version actually has an edge: Origin Access isn't just limited to EA's Xbox One games, so you can expect a ton of third-party games to fill out the PC Vault's library.

Origin Access on PC will cost $4.99 a month, which equates to $60 a year--double that of the Xbox One's $30 annual membership rate. Obviously, you can expect to see more games on Origin Access, so the value is still there. Plus, you're not locked into a commitment on the PC version, so you can cancel anytime.

EVGA has expanded its flagship SuperNOVA T2 lineup of premium power supplies with a trio of enthusiast-grade PSUs stamped with the covered 80 Plus Titanium rating.

EVGA has brought us a ton of high-performance hardware in the past, including a fleet of ultra-fast OC NVIDIA GTX 980 Ti video cards, but now the hardware-maker aims to make its mark in the field of power supplies with its new triumvirate of ultra-efficient PSUs. Today the company's SuperNOVA T2 line gets three new contenders: a titanic 1000W flavor followed up with 850W and 750W variants for less-extreme rigs.

As the company says, "nothing beats titanium", and all three power supplies boast an amazing 90% efficiency under full workloads and 94% under half loads. Although the T2 1000W, T2 850W and T2 750W all feature extremely reliable Japanese Nippon Chemi-Con Solid State Capcitors, EVGA backs each PSU with a 10 year warranty.

CES 2016 - Phanteks has teased its Enthoo Evolv ATX Tempered Glass Edition case recently, showing that a change in material can take a case from seeming mainstream and shoot it into looking spectacular.

Featuring an extremely reflective glass surface, Phanteks' new case features tinted and tempered glass side panels on both sides of the chassis, as reported by Tech Power Up recently. The spectacular side panels are secured through the help of thumb screws and feature this glass material from top to bottom.

With the rest of the chassis being identical to the regular Phanteks Enthoo Evolv ATX spec sheet, expect this new model to hit the shelves in March, priced at $190.

Currently on Kickstarter with under three days remaining, Hult Design has presented its Pavilion wireless speaker and D-spiral acoustic system.

Sitting at $64,613 raised of the $70,000 goal and 65 hours to go at the time of writing this article, this speaker features some amazing design characteristics and has been based on architectural influences from around the globe. Featuring three-dimensional audio, a D-spiral acoustic bass booster, a 20W peerless driver, APTX + AAC codec and touch controls, this product has had its internal speakers provided by Tymphany, a company with over 85 years of experience.

However, style and class comes at a price, with an investment of $279 earning you a black of white Pavilion Q speaker, marked at $110 off retail. If you're looking for more sound, two units are the maximum per person and will set you back $449.

As announced in a recent press release, LG Electronics has invested a massive $435 million into solar cell production, set to increase facilities in the Korean city of Gumi.

With this investment placed in order to increase capacity from 1GW to 1.8GW by 2018, LG is looking to further increase this to a massive 3GW by 2020, enough to power one million homes in total. This investment is part of a wider plan, with LG executive Lee Sang-bong stating that "LG has been actively involved in the solar energy business for two decades, and we believe that mainstream consumers are more than ready to give solar more serious consideration."

This massive commitment has come off the back of its NeON 2 solar energy technology advancement, with LG proudly stating that it has now been practicing in the solar field since 1995, seemingly with no plans to slow down anytime soon.

Despite what the movie posters star billing says, Rey played by newcomer Daisy Ridley was the real star of 'The Force Awakens'. But despite following her substantial character arc, there's still a lot we don't know about her. Why does she seem to have such mastery of the Force? Could it perhaps be down to a strong Jedi bloodline? If you haven't had the chance to see the film yet - be aware of a POTENTIAL SPOILER:

Speaking to the Television Critics Association via SlashFilm, one plucky reporter directly asked if Obi-Wan Kenobi might just be Rey's father. Abrams answered coyly, saying: "I know quite a bit, but obviously it's not for me to talk about in this moment because this is Rian's story to continue now. The last thing I'm going to do is reveal something that he would be upset about. I want to make sure that Rian gets the courtesy he showed me."

Rian Johnson serves as director of the as-yet untitled 'Star Wars: Episode VIII' which will be released in May 2017.

As if it wasn't bad enough as it is with autoplay for all media set to on by default, now even Periscope live feeds will start playing as you scroll through your Twitter feed.

Twitter's own real-time video streaming app has been a very successful venture once it was acquired early on in 2015. It's used for a variety of entertaining things, from pre-show interaction with fans to simply showing the world a small part of your life. It's interesting and can potentially be a tremendous creative outlet. The possibilities are endless, and what would happen if they integrated live 3D video streaming (with an external camera, of course). The world would nearly end.

But before it does, Twitter has naturally turned on autoplay in the iOS app, much to the behest of many social media moguls. This follows a trend set by Facebook that plays videos in as you scroll. In Twitter, only on the iOS app for now, you'll be able to watch, though tapping it will prompt you to open the actual Periscope app in order to actually interact with people.

A heap of new features are coming to version 9.3 of iOS. Once it launches, you'll be able to sleep better, read better, exercise better, teach better, and basically just be an all around amazing human being.

One of the key additions is "Night Shift". If you've used f.lux before, you know the drill: warmer colours on your display in the evening. This restores melatonin production in your brain to normal levels, allowing you to sleep easier. That's the gist of it, anyway.

With CarPlay, you'll get personalized categories as well as "Near Me" functionality, allowing you to quickly find restaurants and such close to you with a quick tap.

CES 2016 - Cooler Master is consolidating their product lines and changing their focus, and that also includes their CPU cooling products as well. At CES they were showing us the new AIO water coolers that they'll be bringing to market as part of their new "Make it Yours" initiative. They also had a new slick looking custom water loop kit and a new air cooler to take a look at.

Despite the small debacle with the patents that might have prevented the sale of the older, and quite effective older series of coolers, they've actually been working on a new design well before that, which was debuted here in their suite at CES. The pump is updated and improved, so coil whine should definitely not be a problem anymore.

There'll be 120mm and 140mm wide selections with up to 280mm in total length as well. If the Nepton series is any indication, then the actual cooling performance should hopefully be similar. And that means it'll be near class leading.

One of the great classics from the PS2 era is being remade for the modern age. Psychonauts will be one of the next games to get the remake treatment especially for the PS4 sometime this Spring.

Psychonauts is a strange yet satisfying platformer that had a near cult following after it was released on the PS2 in 2005. It's also one of only a handful of games that has an overwhelmingly positive, and 5 star or 10/10 rating from users on Steam. And soon you'll be able to enjoy it in remade glory on the PS4. Though it's unclear whether this'll take advantage of the newly minted emulation or not.

This news comes just one day after the studio lead from Double Fine Productions talked more about the plot of the sequel, Psychonauts 2, in an AMA on Reddit. Psychonauts 2 has successfully met its goal of $3.3 million, which it needs to bolster other capital to meet the total $10-13.5 million budget. Another Psychonauts game will also make an appearance on the PS4 via PSVR, titled Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin. That is a lot to look forward to, and hopefully it doesn't over-saturate the franchise.

It takes a special type of editor to produce such a stunningly crap-tacular trailer, but someone behind the upcoming 'Rush Hour' reboot series which hits CBS in March did just that. I should have known it was off to a bad start went it proudly described the Jackie Chan/ Chris Tucker series as "one of the most popular movie franchises of all time". Anyways, make up your own mind.

Neither Chan nor Tucker reprise their roles here, instead Jon Foo and Justin Hires inhabit the roles of Lee and Carter. I mean, what. You couldn't even think up new names? But never fear - fan favourite director Brett Ratner is on board to executive produce.

As much as I love a good sequel, sometimes I despair that all the good ideas have been done already. 'Rush Hour' proves it.

Lenovo's head of mobile Chen Xudong has confirmed in the wake of retiring its Motorola name, it will also be retiring the phones formerly known as the Moto G and the Moto E. The Moto G is the most successful Motorola phone, however Lenovo wants to dedicate the new Lenovo by Moto name to high-end smartphones only and have its other phones satisfy budget and mid-range needs.

Speaking of high-end, the Moto X Play and Moto X Style struggled to achieve significant popularity; one can hope Lenovo's changes mean the next addition to the Moto X family has more to entice buyers.

Two new photos have surfaced from the upcoming Assassin's Creed movie that seem to show both the more modern setting as well as quite the action packed historic backdrop.

Now we can sort of see that the larger plot elements are at least being taken into consideration. There's no explanation as to what kind of captivity Michael Fassbender's character is in, though at least it's in the modern age, or the near future. How they plan on working in the Animus will be interesting.

Now the second shot, below and after the break, is far more action packed and set in what should be 15th Century Spain, which is the era that Fassbender's character is from. But the clothing and other elements actually look like they could be from an earlier time. Regardless, for two hours in 2017, we'll get to watch someone be sneaky and skulk in the shadows while looking for secrets to save the world, instead of playing it ourselves.

It turns out that the leak from last week about the release date is actually correct. Homefront: The Revolution is set to arrive in our game systems on May 17th of 2016. That's not terribly far off, but it's not close enough either. The trailer, below, shows us what the horrors of guerrilla warfare in occupied Philadelphia looks like.

There will be plenty to explore and do as you fight to overthrow the Korean People's Army, with multiple separate zones that'll offer plenty of challenges and opportunities to try out different styles of play. Want to do it the stealthy way? Sure, give it a try. Want to go in guns blazing? That might work too.

The overall theme from the previous Homefront titles should be kept here, though expanded thoroughly with a better AI and more complex missions to go on. Not to mention we should be greeted with a more involved story and lots of cool guns with better graphics. Make sure to use Amazon Prime to get a good discount on pre-ordering games, if you chooses to do that.

CES 2016 - Sennheiser's booth was a very alluring audio enthusiasts paradise, but they were showing off far more than just fancy and expensive headphones. They're pioneers in VR audio.

The most interesting and significant technology that they demonstrated was their proprietary 3D algorithm for they developed for games. The game demo they had running was called EDEN and was mostly a barren landscape rendered with Unreal Engine 4. In that hilly landscape though are a swathe of dinosaurs that are stomping about to help demonstrate what a 3D audio landscape sounds like. And it's a remarkable difference. What this algorithm does is work with HMD's to give an illusory feeling of aural freedom. So when you move your head around, the audio changes appropriately. This is a far cry from typical sound encoding for games.

The API they've created is able to easily calculate those changes, which will likely be a bit more computationally intensive than in the past. This middleware will hopefully make its way to game developers soon, and it would be cool to see a partnership with AMD so they could use their TrueAudio technology to use the GPU to do those calculations. The demo was a bit sparse and it could definitely have used a bit more interactivity, but it was a good first showing of what'll eventually be available. The future of audio is looking bright, such as it did back when Aureal and Creative were battling it out with their a3d and EAX API's.

Remember when we reported that Sony was trying to trademark the term "Let's Play" in reference to online video and gaming? Well, that didn't quite go as they planned, and it ended in failure, though not for the reasons you might initially think.

The USPTO issued a ruling on the 29th of December, which is publicly available, that denies Sony the trademark as-is because it could potentially be confused with an existing trademark of "LP Let's Play" which was initially established in 2013 and for a somewhat similar category of services; "Entertainment services, namely to provide online and offline opportunities for video game enthusiasts to meet and participate in live video game tournaments and on-demand console gaming."

While it might seem ludicrous to some that a common phrase could ever be trademarked, we first have to understand what a trademark is and what it actually applies to, and how the law actually works. Generic terms as a rule cannot and are not able to be trademarked, but if a term is sufficiently descriptive enough of a particular service, then it is indeed possible. But terms can evolve to become generic, too. General terms aren't even legally enforceable, either.

Synaptics had a lot to show off at CES this year, with new advancements in fingerprint reading technology and integration to showing off a very interesting concept for controlling 3D holograms by hovering your fingers mere centimeters over where you perceive the hologram to be.

The hologram they had on display is a showcase of their hover enabled touch controller that allows for the detection of the EM field of your fingers, and can let you manipulate objects on the screen without having to touch it. It's very similar to how some hover-enabled digitizers work.

Controlling the hologram by hovering your finger is a novel concept, but also a natural one. This type of action has been integrated into some parts of Windows since 8.0, where the camera is used to determine motion in order to do simple tasks, say turn a page on a recipe or some such. This could open up a whole plethora of different ways we can control our devices in the future, and such EM reading sensors could be used on surfaces that are usually not touchable too.