Latest News - Page 855

Meta's release of Threads has certainly caught the attention of millions of people, as the app has seen more than 30 million users already create an account.

However, many of those users are reporting the app's lackluster features in comparison to the app's direct competitor - Twitter. Many of the features that users are requesting are already staple features of Twitter, such as the Following tab, Search, and messaging capabilities.

At the forefront of requests is the Following tab, as many users are reporting they don't want to exclusively see content provided by the Threads algorithm, which presents content to users based on what it thinks that users would like.

More than 30 million people have already downloaded and tried Threads, Meta's new text-based app that's a direct competitor to Elon Musk's Twitter.

However, not everyone is going to enjoy Threads, especially if Twitter is already not quite their cup of tea. After trying out Meta's new app for a while and realizing they don't want to use it, a user may feel the need to delete their newly created account, a standard practice for many individuals. Unfortunately, users that have carried out this process have reported their Instagram account also being deleted since Threads is fully integrated with Meta's Instagram.

Meta has acknowledged this problem, and Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, has taken to his Threads account and announced that Meta staff are currently looking into creating a way users can delete their Threads account without also deleting their Instagram account. So, why is this happening? According to Mosseri, "Threads is powered by Instagram, so right now it's just one account", with the Instagram head going on to remind users that they can deactivate their Threads account which hides their profile and post.

A man has been caught by Chinese border security attempting to smuggle in 420 SSDs by strapping them to his body.

Hardware smuggling is becoming a real issue, or at least it is in China, as seemingly many individuals are attempting to get across as much hardware as they can in an effort to resell them to reseller sites for profit. According to Chinese news publication HKEPC, a man has been caught by Chinese authorities attempting to get 420 M.2 SSDs estimated to be worth around $33,000 across the border.

The publication didn't state what models of SSDs the man had strapped all around his body, but given the total estimated price of the haul, we can assume they would have been higher-end storage solutions. This isn't the first time someone has been caught smuggling hardware into China, as it was only in March this year that an individual was caught with 239 CPUs strapped to his body.

Elon Musk's lawyer Alex Spiro has sent a letter to Meta's CEO Mark Zuckerberg, threatening to sue Meta over its recently launched text-based app Threads.

The letter was obtained by Semafor and revealed that Twitter has "serious concerns" that Meta has engaged in "systematic, willful, and unlawful misappropriation of Twitter's trade secrets and other intellectual property" and that the company built Threads with the help of former Twitter staff.

The letter claims that Meta has hired dozens of former Twitter employees, which would have been easy considering Musk fired more than half of Twitter's staff (approximately 3,800 employees), and that these former Twitter staff had access to Twitter's trade secrets, confidential information, and still have ongoing obligations with Twitter. Twitter claims that Meta assigned these former Twitter staff to the development of Threads, which significantly fast-tracked the app's release.

Meta has launched its Twitter competitor called Threads, a text-based app that has full integration with Instagram.

Meta launched its new app on Wednesday on both iOS and Android, and since then, it has gained more than 30 million users and the title of "Twitter-killer". While the app has been criticized for its data tracking, which is no different than Instagram's data tracking, users seem to be enjoying the full Instagram integration that allows for seamless migration of followers from a user's Instagram account to their Threads account.

While many people are excited about the launch, Twitter certainly isn't, as a letter addressed to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, obtained by Semafor, states Twitter believes Meta has misappropriated trade secrets along with other intellectual property. Notably, the letter claims that over the last year, Meta has been hiring former Twitter employees who had access to confidential company information, "owe ongoing obligations to Twitter", and "improperly retained Twitter documents and electronic devices."

When we reviewed the AMD Ryzen 9 "Zen 4" 7950X3D CPU earlier this year, it became clear that it was AMD's best CPU for gaming. The only real downside was that as a flagship model that used AMD's groundbreaking 3D V-Cache technology, it was on the expensive side, and for the price, the non-gaming application performance was a letdown.

Naturally, this led many to look at the more affordable AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D 8-core 16-thread processor that launched a few months later as the best bang-for-your-buck CPU for gaming. Specs-wise, the flagship AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D 16-core 32-thread processor features a higher boost clock speed of 5.7 GHz compared to 5.0 GHz on the 7800X3D, alongside 128MB of L3 Cache compared to 98MB.

And now, you can pick up a new AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D over at Amazon or Newegg at the discounted price of USD 557, a 17% reduction from the CPU's original MSRP of USD 699. This still puts its price on the high-end consumer CPUs, but it's more than enough of a discount to make the case for it being an excellent choice for enthusiast rigs.

AMD Software Adrenalin Edition 23.7.1 is here for Radeon graphics card owners. Although it doesn't feature anything brand-new in terms of game optimizations for upcoming releases, it does manage to resolve one big issue that has been around since the Radeon RX 7900 XT and Radeon RX 7900 XTX launched in December 2022.

And that is, it resolves the high-idle power issue that became an ongoing issue when pairing either one of these GPUs with a 4K FreeSync display or multimonitor display configuration. Another big fix comes to VR performance, with the release notes for the new Radeon drivers noting that "suboptimal performance or occasional stuttering" when playing VR games on the Radeon RX 7000 series has also been resolved.

It's great to see these fixes from AMD, as it showcases that even though some issues can linger for months, the Radeon team is paying close attention to the 'Known Issues.' Hopefully, we'll see the 'Factory Reset' installation issue resolved soon, too - as that one has been listed for a while after reports of the feature causing havoc with Windows.

ADATA has launched its latest PCIe Gen5 storage solution, the LEGEND 970, and it features a robust active cooling solution with the company's "patented heat dissipation" technology. It achieves sequential read and write speeds of up to 10,000 MB per second, so it's speedy to boot.

With PCIe Gen5 storage pushing speeds to new heights compared to what was possible with PCIe Gen4 and Gen3, the additional cooling required to maintain reliable performance without overheating has resulted in several very different Gen5 solutions in recent months. Some with chunky heatsinks, and even others go as far as adding water cooling.

According to ADATA, "active cooling is required for timely heat dissipation during high-speed PCIe 5.0 data transmission" to ensure high temperatures don't impact performance.

Summer is the most colorful time of year, with blue skies, beach balls, and a million flavors of ice cream. But it also brings some of the best deals on Microsoft software. You need to update yours to keep it working smoothly - not to mention safe from the latest security threats. Luckily, you can score the latest versions of Windows, Microsoft Office, and other great software at super-low summer prices.

Check out the selection at software activation keys provider Scdkey.com if you're ready to stop paying the full price. You'll find low prices on Windows, Office, and more. And if you want the biggest savings, enter promo code TT25 at Scdkey.com. That slashes an additional 25% off the site's low prices on software keys. (Plus, you get a free Windows 11 upgrade when you buy Windows 10.

As a trusted vendor, Scdkey sells keys that enable you to activate software downloaded from the official software provider's website or activate it directly on the official website. You'll always see substantial savings - up to 90% off the retail prices.

NetherRealm revealed a new Mortal Kombat 1 trailer during the KombatKast stream today, showcasing some outrageous over-the-top brutality while confirming some new characters.

There really is nothing like a new Mortal Kombat game and MK1 is no exception. The franchise manages to blend humor, gratuitously absurd violence, and a serious compelling storyline all into one chaotic package. The latest Mortal Kombat 1 gameplay trailer showed off all of these elements, complete with a lot of middle fingers and swagger from Johnny Cage, a literal chest-chainsaw from Cyrax that just annihilated poor Kenshi, and some other devastating attacks.

The trailer delivered everything you'd want from Mortal Kombat footage, alongside some awesome reveals of classic returning characters. Gamers got to see Smoke unleash devastating combos with ninja accuracy, Cyrax explode some high-tech grenades that cooked brains, and Rain use shamanic sorcery to fight fire with water and summon brutal storms, and Frost, who attaches glacial spikes to her feet and performs a double jump-kick that pierces right through hapless Johnny Cage's chest.

IO Interactive has opened its fifth studio that will help with ambitious new projects like the 007 James Bond video game.

Hitman developer IO Interactive has launched a brand new studio in Brighton, England as it expands its ranks to assist with production in some major upcoming games. The independent developer currently has two big project sin the works, including the anticipated Project 007 James Bond origin story game, as well as Project Fantasy (aka Project Dragon), a new RPG that's said to be in the works for Xbox.

The Brighton-based branch joins other studios located in Copenhagen, Denmark, Malmo, Sweden, Barcelona, Spain, and Istanbul, Turkey. IO Interactive CEO Hakan Abrak says that the central idea with the company's myriad of studios is to have around 140-150 people in each branch. Abrak wants to avoid having many hundreds of people in a single location--Abrak tells GamesIndustry.biz that he doesn't want IO Interactive to feel like a video games factory.

Intel's Raptor Lake Refresh should be 'good enough' to serve as the next generation of CPUs from Team Blue, but nothing more - so don't get overly excited about it, or the flagship 14900K.

That's the gist of a bunch of new revelations from YouTube leaker Moore's Law is Dead (MLID).

Previously, we'd been hearing talk about clock speeds for Raptor Lake Refresh being pushed much higher than with current-gen CPUs - like to 6.4GHz, or even 6.5GHz - but apparently the Core i9-14900K will most likely top out at a boost speed of 6.2GHz (or perhaps 6.3GHz at a stretch, but it is 'incredibly unlikely' it'll go above that).

Nintendo continues to increase its research and development (R&D) budget as its next-generation Switch console looms on the horizon.

Nintendo is currently working on its new console, which is believed to be an upgraded Switch handheld hybrid that allows for upscaled 4K gaming. A lot is unknown about the device--publishers like Activision don't even know specifications yet--but there's rumors of devkits being sent out to select developers. The new Switch, dubbed the Switch+, Super Switch, and Switch 4K, may be powered by a new Tegra Orin processor accompanied by the enhanced Switch OLED dock which has been updated to support 4K video output.

Speculation aside, we do know that Nintendo is steadily increasing its R&D budget to prepare for new hardware, software, and services. According to Nintendo's 2023 annual report, the company spent around $827 million on R&D throughout Fiscal Year 2023. This budget is for the entirety of Nintendo's operations and is not just for the next-gen Switch.

Capcom tells investors that it will take 'great care' in how it approaches new Mega Man game releases.

Mega Man was the first game that Capcom released on home consoles and the franchise remains a prized IP for the publisher. That's why Capcom has no real interest in rushing out new Mega Man products out the door in order to maximize sales. Even though Capcom wants to eventually hit 100 million game sales per year, the company still wants to be cautious with its revered platformer series.

In a recent shareholders meeting, Capcom management held a Q&A session regarding the future of the business. Investors were interested in knowing where Mega Man goes from here--will we see another mainline release?

Cheaters are an ever-present thorn in the side when it comes to online games, but Ubisoft has a seemingly effective way to tackle the menace they present called 'QB' technology - plus the company has been honing another feature (MouseTrap) to weed out mouse and keyboard players on console.

First off, let's look at QB, and as PC Gamer reports, this is attacking the problem at its source - namely the developers of cheats, and making life so difficult and tedious for them that they just give up.

We know very little about this QB tech, which is for the PC platform only, with Ubisoft kicking off with the idea back in November 2022, as part of a raft of anti-cheat initiatives.

NVIDIA's RTX 4060 Ti graphics card launched in an initial incarnation that offered 8GB of VRAM, much to the chagrin of many gamers, and if you were waiting for the 16GB variant, it's almost at hand now.

We already knew that NVIDIA was planning on bringing the 16GB flavor out in July, of course, but we're still not sure exactly when - info that MEGAsizeGPU, a regular hardware leaker on Twitter has provided.

As ever, treat this with a good deal of caution, but the theory is that the RTX 4060 Ti 16GB will emerge on July 18, which is just under a fortnight away.

The race to achieve a boost clock frequency of 4 GHz on a GPU looks to be over, with American overclocker Allen "Splave" Golibersuch hitting this milestone moments ago, recording a GPUPI V3.3 - 32B result of 4005 MHz.

Bang on 4 GHz, and although the HWBOT submission outlines a 45sec 402ms run with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 at 4005 MHz - we assume this is the same flagship liquid-cooled ROG Matrix GeForce RTX 4090 all-in-one from ASUS he used to achieve a 3.94 GHz result just days ago.

The race to 4 GHz has been heating up recently, with overclocker Cens pushing a Colorful GeForce RTX 4090 iGame LAB to an incredible 3.975 GHz reclaiming the OC crown. We posted that achievement earlier today, so Splave hitting 4 GHz looks to have made that world record attempt somewhat short-lived.

Recently we reported on NVIDIA working with PCI-SIG to redesign the 12VHPWR connector for the GeForce RTX 40 Series with the new 12V-2x6 power connector as part of the new ATX 3.1 standard. This revelation came to light via an extensive report at Igor's Lab outlining how adjustments to pin depth help alleviate issues with the connection not being seated or plugged in correctly.

The outlet has now posted an additional report showing that the GeForce RTX 4070 Founders Edition model from NVIDIA features a modified 12VHPWR connector compared to what was seen on the GeForce RTX 4080 Founders Edition.

It notes that the RTX 4070 connector features a 1.7 mm inward offset for the sensor pins, compared to the 0.45 mm offset for the RTX 4080, and this is similar to what is being planned for the new 12V-2x6 connector being developed.

The race to hit and sustain a 4 GHz boost clock frequency on a GPU is heating up, with the Colorful GeForce RTX 4090 iGame LAB reclaiming the OC crown after being overclocked to an incredible 3.975 GHz. This new world record arrives just a couple of days after ASUS posted its result of 3.94 GHz for its new flagship GPU the ROG Matrix GeForce RTX 4090.

Of course, these results result from extreme overclocking with LN2 cooling and see hardware makers partner with veteran and talented OC masters. On the ASUS side, it partnered with overclocker SPLAVE; for Colorful, that's overclocker Cens.

And with Cens managing to get within 25 MHz of the 4 GHz barrier, there's a good chance we might see that barrier being smashed very soon.

ENERMAX has launched its new range of ATX 3.0 80 PLUS Gold-certified power supplies with the REVOLUTION D.F. X Series. Starting from 850W and going up to a massive 1600W, the REVOLUTION D.F. X Series is designed for high-end enthusiast performance and is ATX 3.0 and PCIe 5.0 ready.

80 PLUS Gold-certified and compliant make this new ENERMAX power supply range something to consider for those putting together a high-end PC gaming build, where you've also got industrial-grade 100% Japanese capacitors and advanced design features to deliver performance and reliability. ENERMAX notes that with better components, you reduce unnecessary power consumption and effectively save energy.

For modern GeForce RTX 40 Series graphics cards, you have a native 600W 12VHPWR cable and connection with an additional 600W 12VHPWR adaptor cable for multiple GPUs. And even though this is a high-end PSU from ENERMAX, the 140mm-depth size makes it one of the smallest high-wattage power supplies.