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One of Apple TV+'s biggest shows faces uncertainty over budget clashes
Foundation, one of Apple TV+'s most popular sci-fi shows, currently has its first two seasons available to watch on the streaming service. But work on the third season is starting to experience issues with a new report noting that there is confusion over its showrunner while there are also worries over the budget related to the show.
According to a Hollywood Report report, co-creator David S. Goyer is stepping back from his showrunner duties and instead, it will be down to executive producer Bill Bost to move to Prague to oversee filming. Prague is where the third season of the show is being shot.
The same report says that Goyer and executives at the show's production company, Skydance, had clashed over the budget for the third season. Streamers, including moneybags Apple, are thought to be tightening their belts in an attempt to make sure that they aren't overspending.
Continue reading: One of Apple TV+'s biggest shows faces uncertainty over budget clashes (full post)
Weird and wonderful things you can play Doom on number 28: A robot lawnmower (yes, really)
'It runs Doom' is a meme you're doubtless familiar with (as well as 'Can it run Crysis?') and the latest weird and wonderful device Doom runs on is a lawnmower.
Confused? We don't blame you, but it's true. Some enterprising souls (or perhaps, more accurately, damned ones) have managed to port the 1993 shooter to a robot lawnmower.
This is a Husqvarna Automower (NERA) with a small integrated display, which the game can be rendered on, and then played using a control knob below. The latter can be used to turn the player left or right, you can press the Start button of the mower to move forward, and press in the control knob to fire.
Apple's iOS 17.4 will disable web apps in the EU and that could spell trouble for the company
When Apple releases the iOS 17.4 software update to the public within the next couple of weeks it will bring with it a number of changes aimed squarely at the EU. Support for third-party app stores and third-party browser engines are at the top of the list of changes, but it will also see Apple ditch support for progressive web apps, or PWAs, in the territory as well. And that's a move that could see the company get into trouble.
PWAs are websites that, when added to the iPhone's Home Screen, act as if they were real apps and launch in a window rather than within a web browser. However, iOS 17.4's beta has already removed support for PWAs in the EU with Apple warning that it has to do that to prevent security and privacy issues arising from the use of web apps that aren't locked within WebKit's walled garden. However, the move will prevent some web apps from working and break others in ways that we might not even know about yet, and it could be enough to get Apple another fine from the European Commission.
According to a new Financial Times report Apple is already being looked at by the EC with the commission having reached out to developers to try and figure out the impact the change will have on them and users alike.
iPhone 16 Pro again tipped to sport 5x tetraprism lens
When Apple announced the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max back in September of 2023 both of the cameras got updates, but it was only the bigger of the two models that were unveiled with new 5x zoom capabilities. That was made possible thanks to the use of a new tetraprism camera lens that folded light in a way that allows for increased zoom without moving the camera lens and sensor further away from each other. Apple wasn't able to fit the fancy lens into the smaller iPhone 15 Pro. That looks set to change with the launch of this year's models.
We've been hearing that there are plans for the iPhone 16 Pro to sport the same 5x camera for a little while now and a new report now backs that up even further. If accurate, the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max will offer 5x optical zoom thanks to a tetraprism lens.
This latest report comes via Taiwanese research firm TrendForce and was shared in a press release that added fuel to the zoom lens fire.
Continue reading: iPhone 16 Pro again tipped to sport 5x tetraprism lens (full post)
iPhone's iOS 18 update won't borrow big design changes from the Apple Vision Pro, report claims
Apple is widely expected to announce the new iOS 18 iPhone software as soon as this June, with that likely to be the month that the company's annual WWDC event will take place. That event will also likely see Apple unveil new software for the iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and Apple Vision Pro but none of those software updates are expected to ship until much later in the year.
Now, writing in the weekly Power On newsletter, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman says that while the iOS 18 software update will bring plenty of changes and improvements for iPhone owners to look forward to, those expecting visionOS-powered changes will be left disappointed.
According to the paywalled version of the Power On newsletter, reported by 9to5Mac, the iOS 18 update will feature plenty of improvements but there will not be a total overhaul that takes cues from visionOS. There had been rumors that Apple would take the visionOS software that powers the Apple Vision Pro and then use that as a basis for what iOS would look like moving forward. That would include more transparency than is currently seen on the iPhone, alongside other changes.
Give an image to Genie and Google's AI can make a 2D platformer out of it, right there and then
GoogleDeepMind has an 'open endedness team' and we've just found out what they've been up to in recent times - namely facilitating AI to generate 2D platformer worlds based on simple image prompts.
You can see how it works in the above tweet from the team lead at GoogleDeepMind, who is Tim Rocktaschel (also a professor of AI at UCL).
This is Genie, a 'foundation world model' (with 11 billion parameters) trained on internet videos. Give Genie ('Generative Interactive Environments') an image of any kind of world and it can knock up a 2D environment you can then run around in platformer-style.
Don't expect any big macOS design changes this year, new report warns
Every year Apple announces new software for its many devices and platforms including the iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and this year surely, the Apple Vision Pro. You can add the Mac to that list as well, and it's the upcoming macOS software update that has been discussed in a new report by Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
Writing in the weekly Power On newsletter Gurman said that Apple is of course working on the 2024 Mac software update but there is bad news for those who are hoping for big design changes this time out.
9to5Mac reported on the paywalled version of Gurman's newsletter in which he mentioned that while there are some notable changes expected in the upcoming iOS 18 iPhone software update, things are going to be different on the Mac. We can expect a new update this year, but Gurman says that Apple's work on notable design tweaks has only just started and that the bigger update won't be ready until 2025 or 2026.
Continue reading: Don't expect any big macOS design changes this year, new report warns (full post)
This is how much it costs to build an Apple Vision Pro - and it isn't $3,500
The Apple Vision Pro virtual and augmented reality headset is now on sale across the United States with prices starting at $3,499. That gets buyers the 256GB model while anyone who needs additional storage can choose to pay more for the 512GB or 1TB models. But with the prices so high, you might be wondering how much it costs Apple to build such a product. And now we might have the answer.
Apple obviously makes plenty of profit on such a device, but that doesn't mean that the Apple Vision Pro is cheap to make - far from it. Featuring two 4K HDR displays and an array of sensors and cameras, the Apple Vision Pro is a complex bit of kit. And according to a new report, it costs a cool $1,542 to build.
That's according to a CNBC report citing research firm Omdia, at least. The report says that the bill of materials for the headset is a costly one, with those 1.25-inch Sony microLED displays accounting for a good chunk of the money. The report notes that each display costs Apple $228 which means that each headset is full of $456 worth of displays alone.
Apple's first HomePod with a display isn't coming until next year at the earliest
Apple currently sells the second-generation HomePod and the HomePod mini as its only smart speaker models, but there is constant talk of a third option being added to the lineup. Rumors of Apple working on a HomePod with an iPad-like display attached have been flying for years, and now a new report again adds new fuel to that fire. But there's a big catch - the new model isn't likely to arrive in 2025.
That's according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman who was writing as part of the weekly Power On newsletter for Bloomberg. Gurman says that Apple continues to work on a HomePod that has an iPad-like display attached to a robotic arm that can move, while the device would combine an Apple TV, FaceTime, and a smart speaker. Apple has also reportedly looked into whether it should launch a smart display, like an iPad, that can be magnetically attached to a wall. It isn't yet clear which route Apple will take, however.
Gurman says that he doesn't believe that Apple's progress suggests that it will be able to launch any of these new products imminently, either. Apple has reportedly been indecisive about what it should do in the smart home space for years, but development does remain underway Gurman suggests that nay new HomePod with a display is unlikely to arrive until 2025 at the earliest.
PlayStation 5 Pro specifications have been shared with third-party publishers, says insider
A known industry insider has revealed that third-party publishers have received the PlayStation 5 Pro specifications ahead of the release of Sony's highly anticipated console.
The rumors come from the latest episode of the Sacred Symbols podcast, where host and well-known industry insider Colin Moriarty said that a medium-sized third-party publisher told him that the company received the PlayStation 5 Pro specification sheet.
Additionally, Moriarty said first and second-party developers have already received the specification sheet, leading assumptions to there being a good chance that leaks will happen more frequently regarding the capabilities of the PS5 Pro, considering multiple publishers and developers purportedly have the specifications sheet.
AMD drops the price of the Radeon RX 7700 XT to $419 USD starting today
AMD has officially dropped the price of the Radeon RX 7700 XT GPU, with the "new pricing" enabling partners to sell models for as low as $419 USD, a $30 price drop from the original MSRP of $449. Many have been hoping to see this happen as the Radeon RX 7700 XT was overshadowed by the Radeon RX 7800 XT when the two GPUs launched in 2023 - with only $50 separating the two.
Having reviewed a few Radeon RX 7700 XT models last year, praising the 1080p and 1440p gaming performance, a recurring con was that pricing was too close to the Radeon RX 7800 XT. The new $419 price makes the GPU better value for money, with the GPU generally outperforming the GeForce RTX 4060 Ti in more workloads and tests.
The new price comes into effect today, Monday, February 26 - so expect $419 or thereabouts to become the new norm for the Radeon RX 7700 XT in the coming days.
AMD has re-launched the Radeon RX 7900 GRE as a standalone GPU starting from $549
AMD's Radeon RX 7900 GRE (Golden Rabbit Edition) initially launched in China, a cutdown version of its flagship RDNA 3 GPU hardware that - at the time - was an odd release that predated the arrival of the Radeon RX 7800 XT; its performance most closely resembles AMD's $499 offering. After rumors and leaks, it looks like AMD is making the Radeon RX 7900 GRE available worldwide starting February 27 at a competitive price of $549 USD.
Priced the same as the GeForce RTX 4070 and sitting between the Radeon RX 7800 XT and GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER, it's a GPU build for 1440p and 4K gaming. $500 - $600 is now a heavily stacked enthusiast price bracket thanks to the addition of NVIDIA's new SUPER variant and RTX 4070 price drop earlier this year, so this release makes a lot of sense with the competition.
The AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE features 16GB of GDDR6 memory, and 80 compute units with RT and AI accelerators, with AMD claiming that when it comes to 1440p gaming, it's 14% faster, on average, than the GeForce RTX 4070 - making it better value for money.
Nintendo Switch 2 scheduled for March 2025 release
It was only last week that multiple outlets reported Nintendo's next-generation console wasn't going to be released this year and is scheduled for release in early 2025.
Those multiple outlets were Bloomberg, VGC, Eurogamer, and more, and each cited individual sources that referred to an internal document that was sent to third-party developers informing them about the delayed launch of the next-generation console. Notably, last week's reports stated the delay of the presumably Nintendo Switch 2 was to give developers enough time to gather a stronger launch line-up.
Now, VideoCardz is reporting that the purported Nintendo Switch 2 won't be released earlier than March 2025, which coincides with the release of the Nintendo Switch (March 2017). The publication sources Japanese website Nikkei, which states the successor to the Nintendo Switch will feature both a "stationary and portable version", a larger screen than the Switch at 6.2-inches, and will be able to run games that feature a "higher-definition image quality".
Continue reading: Nintendo Switch 2 scheduled for March 2025 release (full post)
Overclocking world record hit with G.SKILL Trident Z5 DDR5 memory
A new overclocking world record has been set by Soonho "SAFEDISK" Jeong in SuperPi-32M with G.SKILL DDR5 memory.
G.SKILL has announced that its Trident Z5 DDR5 memory has been used to hit a new overclocking world record in SuperPi-32m, with SAFEDISK hitting an astonishing 2 minutes 59 seconds 919 milliseconds with the use of G.SKILL's Trident Z5 RGB DDR5 memory, ASUS ROG Maximus Z790 Apex Encore motherboard, and Intel Core i9-14900KF CPU, while under liquid nitrogen cooling.
The new world record marks the first time this benchmark category has reached under 3 minutes, with SAFEDISK beating the previous record of 3 minutes, 1 second, and 156 milliseconds. Notably, with the use of liquid nitrogen, the CPU temperature reached as low as -188°C and hit 8449.2MHz. As for memory, the Trident Z5 RGB DDR5 reached as low as -60°C to reach DDR5-9052 with timings of CL32-48-45-36.
Continue reading: Overclocking world record hit with G.SKILL Trident Z5 DDR5 memory (full post)
Robot snaps 1st photo of the moon before its historic landing
The lunar lander that successfully landed on the surface of the Moon on February 22 sent back a photograph of the lunar surface while it began to circle the Moon in preparation for landing.
The lunar lander named Odysseus became the first US-built lander to touch down on the surface of the Moon since the Apollo 17 missions in 1972. Odysseus was constructed by Houston-based company Intuitive Machines, which celebrated its achievement of landing on the lunar surface just a few days ago. However, the landing wasn't without any problems as it appears Odysseus has tipped over, according to Intuitive Machines company CEO Steve Altemus.
Before the landing, Odysseus was instructed to enter the Moon's orbit in preparation for the touchdown, and while the lander approached the Moon's orbit, it captured its target with its Terrain Relative Navigation camera at a distance of approximately 62,137 miles. As for Odysseus now, Altemus said the phone-booth-sized spacecraft likely tipped over after one of its feet caught a rock located on the surface of the Moon, or Odysseus had accidentally landed/fallen into a crater.
Continue reading: Robot snaps 1st photo of the moon before its historic landing (full post)
Helldivers 2 confirms maximum player capacity has now increased
Helldivers 2 has quickly become one of the most popular games on both PC and PlayStation 5, but due to its popularity many gamers are left waiting in queues as servers have reached their peak capacity.
The wait might just be a little shorter now that Arrowhead Game Studios' CEO and Helldivers 2's creative director Johan Pilestedt confirmed the maximum capacity cap has been increased over the weekend. The studio of just 100 developers have been working around the clock to keep the game afloat under the weight of its popularity, with Pilestedt writing on his personal X account that the team has already hit an amazing achievement as the servers handled all players this weekend "without a problem".
Pilestedt wrote that Helldivers 2 servers concurrent player cap has been raised to 800,000 players, which up from the 700,000 cap that was quickly reached. In response to the 700,000 concurrent player cap being reached Arrowhead Game Studios decided to temporarily restrict the player cap to 450,000 while the developers implemented on-the-fly fixes. Pilestedt stated in his X post that "There might be light queues to get in at peak".
Continue reading: Helldivers 2 confirms maximum player capacity has now increased (full post)
NASA's Webb discovers evidence that's breaking the scientific model of the universe
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has discovered a galaxy in the early universe that's so massive that its mere existence challenges current theories of the evolution of the universe.
According to the authors behind the study, which has recently been published in the scientific journal Nature, astronomers diving through Webb's data discovered a galaxy called ZF-UDS-7329. This galaxy contains more stars than the Milky Way and formed just 800 million years after the occurrence of the Big Bang (13.8 billion years ago).
The discovery of this galaxy poses a "significant challenge" to current cosmological models of the formation of the universe as it appears the galaxy and its stars formed without dark matter due to the period of time in which the formation occurred - something that was previously thought impossible per current cosmological models. Study co-author Claudia Lagos explained early galaxies are typically believed to have formed through massive dark matter structures holding matter together, essentially seeding the emergence of a galaxy.
Stunning photo of the Sun erupting in fiery rage captured by space probe
As the Sun approaches its peak in activity a space probe has snapped an incredible photograph of the intensity increasing on the solar surface.
The peak in solar activity is called the solar maximum, and it's the height of an 11-year solar cycle. During this period, the Sun's strong magnetic fields shift more frequently, which creates sunspots, flares, explosions, loops of plasma, and swirls of superheated gas. The above and below images were snapped by the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) instrument equipped to the European Space Agency's (ESA) Solar Orbiter space probe.
According to the space agency, the most recent solar minimum occurred in December 2019, which is a time when the Sun's activity is at its lowest, as showcased by the image snapped in February 2021. The ESA writes on its website that the solar maximum is expected to take place sometime in 2025, with some astronomers predicting the solar maximum could arrive even earlier given how active the Sun has been.
US makes history with first Moon landing since 1972, but there's one major problem
US space exploration history books have a new entry as the first privately built Moon lander has touched down on the surface of the Moon, marking the first U.S.-built spacecraft to do so since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.
The first US company to achieve a Moon landing is Houston-based Intuitive Machines, which partnered with NASA to construct and send the Odysseus lunar lander to the surface of Earth's closest neighbor. The scientific community held their breath as Odysseus descended to its designated landing location near the lunar south pole, and on February 22, the touchdown was confirmed. Odysseus is equipped with NASA science instruments and tech demonstrations that are expected to still be functional after Odysseus encountered its big problem.
While the landing was deemed successful and Intuitive Machines announced Odysseus was "upright", Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus announced during a press conference that the aforementioned claim the lunar lander was upright was based on "stale telemetry" sourced from the lander's fuel gauges, and Odysseus is likely laying on its side. Altemus said that the phone-booth-sized spacecraft likely tipped over due to one of its feet being caught up on a rock during entry, or it's stuck in a crevasse, or simply lying on a lunar slope.
Microsoft to detail DirectSR (Super Resolution) at GDC 2024 on March 21
Microsoft has something new to show off at the upcoming Game Developer Conference (GDC 2024), which starts on March 21, with the introduction of DirectSR (or Direct Super Resolution) technology.
We don't know what DirectSR will be doing exactly, but we can expect Microsoft's new super resolution technology to be something you simply enable in Windows and would support Intel, AMD, and NVIDIA graphics cards. This means standardizing super resolution technology at a software level, helped by GPU-accelerated cores.
Microsoft hasn't been clear on the GPU cores or architectures, but I'm sure we'll see details at GDC 2024 next month. This is important to game developers, which need to add each upscaling technology individually -- Intel with XeSS, AMD with FSR, and NVIDIA with DLSS -- DirectSR could solve a lot of this, offering some kind of super resolution support by default.






















