PS5 lead system architect Mark Cerny has officially confirmed the beefed-up PlayStation 5 Pro console, which is exactly what the leaks said: 45% faster in rendering, up to 2-3x faster in RT, and it features AI-based upscaling tech called PSSR (PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution).

The new PS5 Pro will be launching on November 7, 2024 and priced at $699.99 with a similar, but slimmed-down look of the PS5. Inside, there's up to 45% faster rendering, 2-3x performance improvements in ray tracing, and some heavy performance upgrades thanks to PSSR on the PS5 Pro.

Sony offers two rendering modes on the standard PS5: Fidelity Mode (30FPS) and Performance Mode (60FPS). The higher fidelity mode renders at a higher resolution and graphics quality, but drops down into the 30FPS mark which isn't good to play with. Performance Mode drops the rendering resolution and detail quality, but increases the performance to 60FPS. Cerny notes that PS5 gamers are choosing Performance Mode around 3/4 of the time.

OpenAI is reportedly considering heavily increasing the cost of its subscription-based services for its AI chatbots, with the current $20 monthly fee for its ChatGPT Plus service possibly seeing a new ceiling of $2000 per month for its next-gen AI model Strawberry.

In a new report by The Information, we could see OpenAI charging as much as $2000 per month for its AI chatbots, especially if we see some radical upgrades out of Strawberry, its latest AI model. Its new Strawberry model has been referred to as "GPT-Next" and should roll out before the end of 2024, according to the latest reports (more on that below).

Strawberry will reportedly have "System 2 thinking" which will allow GPT-Next to take the time to deliberate and reason through problems, versus just predicting longer and longer sets of tokens to complete its responses. System 2 thinking has impressive results: scoring over 90% on the MATH benchmark, a collection of advanced mathematical problems.

AMD has confirmed it will have its new "Krackan" APU launching in early 2025, aiming at the $799 notebook market ready for Copilot+ in 2025.

The big difference between the just-launched Ryzen AI 300 series "Strix Point" APUs and the new "Krackan" (also rumored as "Kraken Point") is that it will drop down to 8 cores of Zen 5 (4 x Zen 5 + 4 x Zen 5c) and a heavily cut-down 8 CUs of RDNA 3.5 GPU (compared to 16 CUs of RDNA 3.5 on Strix Point, and 40 CUs of RDNA 3.5 on Strix Halo).

AMD's upcoming Krackan APU will feature the same Zen 5 CPU + RDNA 3.5 + XDNA 2 NPU, so we have Copilot+ ready for 2025, with enough TOPS (45-50 TOPS) for AI workloads of the future (and to compete against Intel Lunar Lake and Qualcomm Snapdragon X).

Sony reportedly took just 19 months from prototyping the upgraded PlayStation 5 Pro console to its release, according to insider Tom Henderson.

In a new post on X, Henderson posted: "from prototyping to release, Mark Cerny and the PlayStation hardware team took 19 months in total, and they never missed a single deadline. Impressive stuff". Cerny is about to take the stage a few hours from now for the PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation, where we should be introduced to the new PS5 Pro console.

I wouldn't expect a huge deep dive as Sony isn't into that at its announcement of consoles, but we know to expect around 45% more performance from the PS5 Pro over the standard PS5. Not only that, but wicked new AI-powered PSSR technology (PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution) and AMD's new RDNA 4-based GPU tricks that provide 2-3x the RT (ray tracing) performance.

Rambus has just unveiled the industry-first HBM4 controller IP that will accelerate next-generation AI workloads.

The new Rambus HBM4 controller enables a new generation of HBM memory deployments for cutting-edge AI accelerators, graphics, and HPC applications. Rambus' new HBM4 controller supports the JEDEC spec of 6.4Gbps, supporting operations of up to 10Gbps with a throughput of 2.56TB/sec to each memory device. The new Rambus HBM4 controller IP can be paired with third-party of customer PHY solutions to instantiate a HBM4 memory subsystem.

Neeraj Paliwal, SVP and general manager of Silicon IP, at Rambus, said: "With Large Language Models (LLMs) now exceeding a trillion parameters and continuing to grow, overcoming bottlenecks in memory bandwidth and capacity is mission-critical to meeting the real-time performance requirements of AI training and inference. As the leading silicon IP provider for AI 2.0, we are bringing the industry's first HBM4 Controller IP solution to the market to help our customers unlock breakthrough performance in their state-of-the-art processors and accelerators".

TSMC will get its very first High-NA EUV lithography machine from ASML later this month, after saying it didn't want or need ASML machines to make future chips, the Taiwan semiconductor giant will now get its first High-NA EUV machine and have installation begin by the end of September 2024.

According to Taiwanese media, TSMC will get its first High-NA EUV lithography machine later this month, so it can continue its dominance over South Korean semiconductor rival, Samsung. Intel has been receiving and setting up -- as well as paying billions of dollars with ASML -- its new High-NA EUV lithography machines, and now TSMC is joining the High-NA EUV fray.

ASML's new TwinScan EXE:5000 High-NA EUV lithography machines cost approximately $380 million USD per machine, but TSMC will have no problems ponying up the cash as it is swimming in it with its semiconductor dominance worldwide.

Sony has officially announced an exciting new "PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation" hosted by the PS5 architect himself, Mark Cerny... so expect the beefed-up PS5 Pro unveiling in just a few hours time, and here's how to tune in when it happens:

Sony posted to its official PlayStation account on X to tune into their PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation hosted by Mark Cerny, which will be a 9-minute stream that begins on September 10 at 8AM PST / 4PM BST. We've got some more time zones for you to tune in wherever you live across the world, as I'm sure there will be some gamers who want to stay up late -- or get up early -- for the PS5 Pro announcement.

As for where to watch it, you can tune into the PS5 Pro reveal event aka "PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation" on the official PlayStation YouTube account below:

Apple has just wrapped up its Glowtime event, where it unveiled its newest generation of iPhone devices, along with a bunch of other Apple products such as the Apple Watch Series 10, AirPods 2, and AirPods Max.

The star of the show was definitely the three new iPhone models that will be available for pre-order this Friday. But what are the differences you should know about? This year Apple has closed the specification gap between the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max, with the only major differences in the devices being in the following categories: battery, screen size, and starting storage capacity. That is it.

Last year, Apple introduced the 5x Telephoto lens that sported Tetraprism technology to the iPhone 15 Pro Max, while the iPhone 15 Pro was limited to 3x. This year, the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max have the exact same camera array. The screen size on the iPhone 16 Pro comes in at 6.3 inches, while the iPhone 16 Pro Max has a 6.9-inch display. Battery life is slightly more severe in terms of a difference between the two devices, as the iPhone 16 Pro will last up to 27 hours when playing a video compared to 33 hours on the iPhone 16 Pro Max.

AI music generators have become all the rage since the explosion in popularity of AI-generation tools, but now we are starting to hear the oddities that can come out of AI generation.

A Reddit user has posted a short clip that was created using the music generation software known as Suno. The user wrote that with the 24-second clip, the AI sounded like it was crying at the end of the video and that this crying wasn't part of the prompt that created the clip. The user wasn't alone, as another commented that an AI-generated song that has since been posted on Spotify features an outburst at the end where users can audibly hear "No!".

So, what could be causing these strange and seemingly emotional outbursts? Well, these AI systems are designed to create music based on the keywords provided in the user's prompt. It appears that Suno is attempting to create a human-esc outro, which can often feature fading pieces of audio and sometimes single words or sounds.

Apple has unveiled its new iPhone 16 family of smartphones, with the flagship A18 Pro chip powering the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max handsets with some impressive features and abilities.

Inside, the new Apple A18 Pro chip has been designed with industry-leaving compute power that will super-boost Apple Intelligence, with a second-generation 3nm technology from TSMC, featuring a new architecture that's smaller, with faster transistors, and increased efficiency.

Apple's new A18 Pro chip features a new 16-core Neural Engine that is faster and more efficient than previous generations, with remarkable on-device performance for Apple Intelligence. We have a 17% increase in total system memory bandwidth -- the highest ever for an iPhone -- and a new 6-core GPU that's 20% faster than the previous-generation, as well as hardware-accelerated ray tracing that is up to 2x faster on the new A18 Pro.

Back in 2020, AMD announced it was splitting its post-GCN architecture into RDNA for gaming, with CDNA for its data center GPUs, with CDNA later being the architecture of its Radeon Instinct AI accelerators... and now, they're merging into UDNA.

In a chat with Tom's Hardware, senior vice president and general manager of the Computing and Graphics Business Group of AMD, Jack Huynh, said: "So, part of a big change at AMD is today we have a CDNA architecture for our Instinct data center GPUs and RDNA for the consumer stuff. It's forked. Going forward, we will call it UDNA. There'll be one unified architecture, both Instinct and client (consumer). We'll unify it so that it will be so much easier for developers versus today, where they have to choose and value is not improving".

AMD simplifying into the UDNA architecture means we'll see a future where developers only need to focus on a single system, no matter if they're building next-gen AI GPU architectures, or next-gen GPU architectures for Radeon in the form of RDNA 5 in the future.

Sony has announced its PlayStation 5 Technical Presentation for tomorrow, hosted by PS5 system architect Mark Cerny, which should be the reveal event for the new beefed-up PS5 Pro console.

I don't know why we'd need a technical presentation on a console that's been on the market for multiple years with tens of millions of PS5 consoles so far, so expect the big PS5 Pro reveal and technical presentation on the beefed-up hardware inside of Sony's new console.

We have been hearing leaks and rumors of the PS5 Pro for months and months now, with a recent PS5 Pro dev kit spotted with 2TB of Gen4 SSD storage and using around 200W of power (while being 45% faster in gaming, and 2-3x faster in RT games through PSSR, the PS5 Pro's AI-powered upscaling technology called PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution).

Lexar has just unveiled the world's first stainless steel encased SD cards, joining the growing Armor Series SD cards, with the new SD cards featuring "bend-resistance" and they're IP68 certified.

The company has unveiled its new Armor Series SD cards in the new Armor Gold SD UHS-II, and Armor Silver Pro SD UHS-II cards in up to 1TB capacities. If you've used an SD card enough -- you know, in and out of your cameras constantly, in and out of your SD card reader or into a laptop -- and the casing can break, well... not with a stainless steel SD card from Lexar.

Lexar says it's using 316 stainless steel in the construction of its new Armor Gold SD UHS-II and Armor Silver Pro SD UHS-II cards, with the company adding its new SD cards are bend-resistant and that they're stronger than regular plastic-encased models. Lexas pushes that its new Armor SD cards are "ideal for outdoor filming".

Sony has raised the price of one of its profitable PlayStation 5 accessories in the U.S.

The PS5's stock DualSense controller has increased by $5 in the United States, representing a 7% price jump for the device. The PS5's DualSense used to have standard MSRP of $70 in the region, and it's not bumped to $75 across all retail channels.

The news comes little over a year after Sony Interactive Entertainment announced that its accessories business was a "highly profitable" unit for the games division.

Apple has hosted its unveiling event for not just the new iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max smartphones, but slightly upgraded AirPods Max headphones have been unleashed.

The new Apple AirPods Max headphones don't do anything new technologically, but the company has removed the Lightning port and upgraded to USB-C connectivity for the new AirPods Max headphones. Those wanting some upgrades -- myself included, as an AirPods Max owner, the only Apple product I own -- will be disappointed, but the move to USB-C is welcomed.

Apple's new AirPods Max headphones also receive support for Personalized Spatial Audio, which will arrive with the upcoming iOS 18 software update that will unleash Apple Intelligence onto the iPhone, ready for the new iPhone 16 family of smartphones. Inside, there is reportedly no upgrade in hardware with the same internal components as the current-gen AirPods Max headphones.

Apple has just unveiled its new iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max smartphones powered by its powerful new A18 Pro chip ready for new experiences and AI workloads of the future.

It wasn't just the new iPhone 16 being revealed: but Apple also introduced its new Apple Watch Series 10, AirPods 4, improved AirPods Pro 2, and the new AirPods Max with new software features and colors as well as USB-C connectivity, finally moving away from Lightning.

Apple's new iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max come in 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB versions starting at $999 (for the iPhone 16 Pro in 128GB capacity). The company is using its new Action Button that was introduced with the iPhone 15 Pro, a programmable button that can do a variety of actions when configured. There's a totally new button, too, which will bring up both the camera and act like a hardware shutter, just like a regular camera.

Over the weekend, I noticed rumors popping up on X about Grand Theft Auto 6 being delayed, but now we're hearing that there is NO delay... but "it's a big, ambitious game and could very well slip" said some Rockstar staffers.

In the tweet above from Bloomberg's Jason Schreier, who posted on X that "the internet (and my DMs) blew up this weekend over a rumor that GTA VI is delayed. Good news is that six Rockstar employees all told me they have not heard of any delay. Bad news: it's a big, ambitious game and could very well slip! Too much time left to say anything definitive".

Personally, I don't see any major delays for GTA 6 given that Sony has reportedly "locked down marketing rights" to the game for its PS5 and upcoming PS5 Pro consoles, and given that the PS5 Pro will be a beefed-up version of the console, we should expect GTA 6 to be run best on the PS5 Pro. Sony is reportedly gearing up to launch the PS5 Pro later this year, with a rumored unveiling of the console in the next 24 hours.

Recently, we reviewed the JMGO N1S Ultra 4K Laser Projector, a portable unit with a stylish and robust design that also delivers a vibrant and impressive 4K image. One reason the crisp and bright image impressed so much was the use of a Triple-Color Laser light source via the company's MALC 2.0 Triple Laser Optics technology. Compared to traditional lamp light sources, it's a game changer.

It delivers a brighter overall image, and the image clarity and contrast are enhanced without the usual laser light 'speckle' effect that traditional laser projectors emit. At IFA 2024, JMGO announced expanding its N1S line-up with two new models, the N1S Ultimate 4K and the N1S Pro 4K. As for how the lineup stacks up, the Ultra we reviewed sits between the Pro and the Ultimate, which makes the Ultimate model the new flagship from JMGO.

The Ultimate has a brightness rating of 3500 ANSI Lumens, while the Pro offers 2,400 ANSI Lumens. All three models have a 1600:1 FOFO contrast ratio, 110% BT.2020 gamut coverage, and exceptional color accuracy.

Intel has released new graphics drivers covering its discrete Arc lineup of desktop GPUs and Intel Core Ultra processors with integrated Arc graphics. Intel Graphics Driver 32.0.101.5989 is available now and is notable because it's the first driver we've seen that has added official support and optimizations for Valve's Deadlock.

Deadlock is currently in early testing, and even though Valve has yet to announce the game or provide official details formally, it's already one of the most-played games on Steam, with well over 100,000 peak concurrent players being recorded daily. The new driver offers a notable performance bump for PC gamers with access to the Deadlock playtest with an Intel Arc graphics card like the A750 or A770.

Per the release notes, Arc gamers can expect "Up to 17% average FPS uplift at 1080p" or "Up to 13% average FPS uplift at 1440p" when playing with maxed-out visual settings.

AMD's Fluid Motion Frames is the company's driver-based frame generation technology that works in every game. It is a one-click solution that boosts the perceived performance in thousands of games, and unlike DLSS 3 or FSR 3, it doesn't require per-game integration.

In July, AMD announced Fluid Motion Frames 2 was coming soon, improving the tech to bring it more in line with more advanced solutions like FSR 3. Alongside the announcement, AMD released a technical preview driver for AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2, allowing Radeon gamers to play around with the latest version of AFMF as part of HYPR-RX.

With improved image quality and latency reduction via AI-optimized enhancement, AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2 works on all Radeon RX 6000 and 7000 Series graphics cards and AMD Ryzen Processors with integrated Radeon Graphics. AMD has updated the AFMF 2 technical preview driver this week with optimizations and stability fixes.