We've been hearing about the Surface Pro 2 tablet from Microsoft for quite a while now, and while that $1 billion write down on the Surface RT may have hurt the Redmond-based giant, that hasn't stopped them from delivering quite the upgrade to the higher-end Surface Pro 2 today.

Microsoft's Vice President of Surface, Panos Panay, took the stage at its NYC event today to unveil the second-generation Surface slates, of which have been under development for over 18 months now. Panay says that the Surface Pro 2 "is literally faster than 95 percent of laptops today." The graphics performance on Surface Pro 2 has been increased by 50%, too.

The kickstand on the Surface Pro 2 has been greatly improved and there is no more Windows logo on the rear of the device, just the Surface branding. The Surface Pro 2 operates cooler, quieter, and includes more battery life - much more battery life. Microsoft has said the Surface Pro 2 features up to 75% more battery life than its predecessor.

Earlier this morning we saw AMD's Radeon R9 290X leak in a series of photos and benchmark test, but that was not the only upcoming GPU to surface in leaked images. AMD's Radeon R7 260X has also appeared in some newly leaked photographs that show off a uniquely designed ducted cooling solution.

The R7 260X is an upper mid-range graphics card that is said to be based off of the "Bonaire" silicon that is featured in the company's Radeon HD 7790 high-in the GPU, but as TechPowerUp reports, it is more likely that the card is based on the "Curacao" architecture given the PCB and component layout on in the photo below. AMD is hosting a press event in Hawaii this Wednesday the 25th and is widely expected to launch its Hawaii-based GPUs. Our own Shawn Baker will be on hand covering the event so stay tuned.

On top of BlackBerry having serious issues, and diving out of the consumer market and letting 4,500 people go, its BBM rollout for Android and iOS has now been put on hold. The Canadian phone maker has said that leaked versions people were using were having "issues" and that they are hard at work to getting it released.

Prior to launching BBM for Android, an unreleased version of the BBM for Android app was posted online. The interest and enthusiasm we have seen already - more than 1.1 million active users in the first 8 hours without even launching the official Android app - is incredible. Consequently, this unreleased version caused issues, which we have attempted to address throughout the day.

Our teams continue to work around the clock to bring BBM to Android and iPhone, but only when it's ready and we know it will live up to your expectations of BBM. We are pausing the global roll-out of BBM for Android and iPhone. Customers who have already downloaded BBM for iPhone will be able to continue to use BBM. The unreleased Android app will be disabled, and customers who downloaded it should visit www.BBM.com to register for updates on official BBM for Android availability.

We saw a tease yesterday of the new status bar with gray icons in Android 4.4 KitKat, but now we have another look from 9to5Google, which gives us a closer look at the redesigned stock apps on Android 4.4.

You can see from the images above that we have the Messaging app, and the Dialer app, which both look quite nice in their updated form. Controls for the Messaging app have been shifted to the top right of the app, and the Dialer app gets a much more streamlined look, with a nice blue color scheme. We should expect Android 4.4 KitKat to arrive mid next month on the rumored Nexus 5 handset.

AMD is expected to unleash it's "Hawaii" GPUs this week, with the newly named Radeon R9-290X leading the pack. There's now a new leak, with some naked shots underneath the heatsink and fan, in all its naked glory.

As you can see, the full PCB features the usual 8+6-pin PCIe power connectivity, which should provide a GPU that comes under the 300W TDP. We can see the numerous GDDR5 chips spread around the GPU socket, but eagle-eyed readers should note there are 16 GDDR5 chips... which means we could expect 4GB and 8GB versions of the new GPUs. This is going to be great for Eyefinity and 4K display setups.

This could all lead down the rabbit hole of a 512-bit memory bus, which would give the new Hawaii GPUs some incredible memory bandwidth. There are some benchmark scores, which I wouldn't put too much faith into right now, but if that's something you want to check out, by all means be our guest!

Apple only started selling its freshly baked iPhone 5S with its TouchID fingerprint scanner built-in, and the biometrics hacking team of the Chaos Computer Club (CCC) has already hacked the biometric security of Apple's TouchID.

The CCC used everyday means of hacking the ToucHID, where they grabbed a fingerprint of the phone user, photographed from a glass surface, which was "easy enough to create a fake finger that could unlock an iPhone 5S secured with TouchID."

A hacker who goes by the name "Starbug" performed the experiments that ended up being successful, said: "In reality, Apple's sensor has just a higher resolution compared to the sensors so far. So we only needed to ramp up the resolution of our fake. As we have said now for more than years, fingerprints should not be used to secure anything. You leave them everywhere, and it is far too easy to make fake fingers out of lifted prints."

Battlefield 4 is a day closer to being played on our PCs or consoles, and now there's a new post on the official Battlefield 4 website that details the second-screen application for BF4, Battlelog.

Battlelog will allow gamers to use a PC, smartphone or tablet for maps, leaderboards and much, much more. The service for BF4 will allow gamers to track how many of their friends are online, and just how many active missions are accessible. Gamers will be able to create emblems, which will be displayed on soldiers and guns in the multiplayer portion of Battlefield 4.

When gamers are away from their PCs or consoles, Battlelog on their smartphones for example can let them view status, access forums and leaderboards, customize their loadout and more. Battlelog is also capable of giving players the chance of remotely joining new servers quickly. The update on the BF4 website says:

Bloomberg Businessweek enjoyed an interview with Apple CEO Tim Cook last week, where Cook reiterated that he believes the tablet market will overpass the PC market within 2 years.

Cook said: "We're 24 months away from that" which isn't too far away at all. Cook also said that most of this growth in the tablet market in coming from PC makers who are making low-cost Android devices as a 'defensive maneuver.' Cook also used the time to talk smack about Android tablets, which is something he has done on more than one occasion.

Cook said: "I think if I bought [an Android tablet] and used it, and I thought that was a tablet experience, I'm not sure I would ever buy another tablet. The responsiveness isn't there. The basic touch is really off. The app experience is a stretched-out smartphone kind of experience. It's not an optimized experience."

Rocking an iPhone 5S and think you're 'sticking it to Samsung' when you use it? Think again. The South Korean giant, and main competitor to Apple, is the company who is making the A7 processor inside each and every iPhone 5S.

Chipworks says that it found design and manufacturing processes on the A7 chip that match up with Samsung-built chips such as the Samsung Exynos Application processor that is baked into the Galaxy S4 smartphone. Samsung will also reportedly supply Apple with components for its upcoming second generation iPad mini tablet.

So while they may be competitors, they still require each other to make money. Apple wouldn't have as many iPhone 5S units if it weren't for Samsung, and Samsung wouldn't be racking in billions manufacturing hardware for Apple.

We should expect Twitter to go public in the next couple of months, but according to a report on Reuters, the social networking site might push its IPO before Thanksgiving.

One source has told Reuters that Twitter could raise over $1 billion in its IPO, and while it may sound like a lot, it is less than 1% of Facebook's record-breaking IPO which smashed through $105 billion. We don't know what Twitter will do when it goes public, but we should expect the biggest Twitter apps to go under the knife and come out looking just a little different. Let's just hope this doesn't happen to Twitter, like it did Facebook.